Ye Olde Fighting Cocks closed its doors “after a sustained period of extremely challenging trading conditions,” according to a statement from landlord Christo Tofalli, posted on the pub’s Facebook page on Friday. Meanwhile, Britain’s self-proclaimed ‘oldest pub,’ Ye Olde Fighting Cocks in St Albans, which has been operating since 793CE, has also fallen victim to COVID-19. The venue became “a bulwark against the tide of closures and a voice against the apathy that had snuck into the core of the conversations around our vital nighttime culture,” Mary’s Group wrote on Instagram. “This was not part of our vision for the Lansdowne … we have decided to call time on our custodianship of this iconic live music venue.”Ī post shared by Mary's ongoing COVID restrictions nearly decimating the live music industry in Sydney, the Lansdowne continued to host music on its bottom floor bar and the upstairs 300-capacity gig room several nights a week over the past few years.
“Our lease is due to expire in the coming months, and the landlords have chosen to close the gig room to build more hostel accommodation,” the post read. The three-storey pub has promoted Sydney bands for decades, been the local watering hole for uni students and inner-city pub-goers, and been the host to many late-night kick-ons.Īn Instagram post last week saw the team at Mary’s announce the decision to close the pub and said that they were “heartbroken to announce that our time with the beloved Lansdowne Hotel is coming to an end. The live music venue has been run by its parent company Mary’s Group, and the building owners since 2017 to bolster live music in Chippendale. The Lansdowne Hotel’s owners have announced plans to reopen and expand its hostel-style accommodation.
#Live music pub sydney free
Tagline? The Lansdowne will be celebrating going pokies-free by putting on a huge free live music event in conjunction with party crew, Bad Deep DJ's and new social movement, Proudly Pokies Free.Sydney live music icon, The Lansdowne Hotel and an English pub that claims to be the oldest in Britain are the latest prolific venues to close down due to COVID-19. "We want a music culture we can be proud of." Their campaign is trying to encourage pubs to move away from the lucrative poker machines to offering live gigs and community based events. "You don't have to have pokies to run venues," he says. "A lot of band rooms were being replaced with poker machines, and it reversed the Sydney live music scene," he says. Tom Lawrence, who started the Proudly Pokies Free campaign, says the music scene was thriving in Sydney before poker machines were introduced to pubs in the 1990s. Western Australia is the only state in the country that doesn't have any pokies.Īustralians lost a whopping $11.6 billion from playing the pokies in 2015, according to the latest Australian gambling statistics. There are 99,000 poker machines in NSW alone, while in Victoria there are about 30,000 machines. "The pub owners don't have to try and get the money in." Addicted to pokiesĪustralia has the highest rate of poker machines in the world - and has more poker machines per person than any other country. "They are rigged to win and the pub offering just drops off," he said. Kenny reopened the landmark pub in June and got rid of 30 poker machines which were raking in about $50,000 a week in revenue for the previous owners. I understand for a lot of pubs the pokies are worth too much." "The revenue is so attractive and they just replaced them with pokies. Some pub owners are relying so heavily on the lucrative revenue from pokies they often don't feel the need to have live music in their venues, he said. "I don't think you can promote live music and have the pokies in the background," he told Hack. The pub is holding up to seven gigs a week, helping to revitalise the city's struggling music scene. The Lansdowne pub, which was one of the longest serving live music venues in Sydney in the 1980s and 90s, is celebrating three months without poker machines and its owner Kenny Graham says getting rid of them has made space for live music.
If more pubs and clubs abandoned their poker machines it could make way for a thriving live music scene, according to a new campaign being launched on Sunday.
0 kommentar(er)
