A group of architects and creatives have presented a Vertical Theatre, a "future-proof" live performance venue designed for socially distancing and is touted as being "tourable" for the pandemic, Broadway World reports. The structure will go up several floors, will have a roof, with optional open sides to allow for optimum airflow and natural ventilation. The audience would be able to sit in balconies that can accommodate groups between 4-12 people or designated social bubbles, and it can hold between 1,200-2,400 fans.

The British government has announced the latest round of its £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund, with this new tranche of aid totaling £18 million to be shared by eight arts and cultural organizations, among them Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club in London, the London Venue Group, and the Academy Music Group. Music Business Worldwide compares this concrete help to the one US venues are being offered.

Canadian venues and performance spaces lit up red Tuesday evening (Sept 22) in a show of support for the live event industry "that is still dark", Indie 88 reports. The #LightUpLive campaign says "the effect of shutting down a $100 billion industry in Canada will have unimaginable impacts on both companies and individuals".

Dallas Observer reports on how venue-owners are coming up with ideas to be able to reopen. Billy Bob’s Texas, the "world’s largest honky-tonk", was closed since March and reopened last weekend, after reclassifying as a restaurant. It normally has a maximum occupancy of 6,000 people, but for now, they’re limiting admissions to 1,200. Temperatures were checked at the door, guests sat at tables spaced 6 feet apart, and masks were worn. Lava Cantina also reopened as a restaurant, it now hosts concerts and movies twice a day, up to six days a week. Space at Lava Cantina is limited to 250 guests compared with their normal 1,800 capacity. Table for four to see Nelly is $400.

"The movie theater business could come back on with a flip of a switch," Audrey Fix Schaeffer, a spokeswoman for the American National Independent Venue Association tells Variety. Live music is much different - "it will take at least four months for touring to be scheduled and for all the venues to be able to have a calendar, because it is such an intricate process". Livestream and socially distanced gigs aren't the solutions either: "The economics don’t work for the vast majority of it, whether it’s streaming, or whether it’s a socially distanced thing, because it costs so much in the overhead that you cannot make it".

Electronic duo Darkstar have shared a simple yet moving tribute to UK venues. The video accompanying their track ‘Blurred' compiles Google Earth footage of music institutions across the UK, reflecting on the ongoing loss of public space and cultural venues.

Music venues in England have been given the green light to reopen from Saturday, BBC reports. Music and performance venues will be able to reopen with socially distanced audiences - venues will have to limit capacity and enforce wearing of masks, Route Note reports. New powers will be introduced to penalise the organisers of mass gatherings including raves. Nightclubs and discos will remain shut. Organisers of illegal raves will face fines of up to £10,000 under new rules. West Midlands Police shut down 125 parties and raves, including one of up to 600 people, last weekend, while London's Metropolitan Police have said that more than 500 illegal events were organised in the city in just one month, Evening Standard reports.

The UK government has pledged £1.57bn of help for country’s museums, galleries, theatres and music venues, hit hard by the big lockdown caused by the Covid-19. The biggest one-off investment in UK culture is welcomed as "surprisingly ambitious" by the industry, Guardian reports.

Radiohead, Nick Cave, The Rolling Stones, Coldplay, PJ Harvey, Johnny Marr, Dizzee Rascal, Primal Scream, Paul McCartney, Dua Lipa, The Cure, are among the huge list of over 1.500 artists who have signed an open letter to the UK government for the #LetTheMusicPlay campaign – demanding immediate action to prevent “catastrophic damage” to the music industry in the wake of the coronavirus lockdown, NME reports. The Music Venue Trust has penned a letter signed by over 560 of their venues calling for a £50 million cash injection to save the “world-beating £5.2billion per year music industry”, allowing these spaces to “hibernate” until October and prevent their permanent closure. If the artists were to add the same amount - which would cost them £30,00 each - those venues would have music easier period ahead of them, right?

"The UK government’s idea of gigging in the age of coronavirus is an unworkable shambles. And no wonder. It’s an experience and an industry of which they have as much first-hand knowledge as a maggot does of mountain biking... Have you seen a Conservative attempting to enjoy music? It’s like watching a drunk goose try to water-ski" - NME's Mark Beaumont writes about his government's plan to save live music venues. There's a real solution - "Luckily the Music Venues Trust, backed by 500 grassroots venues across the country, have come up with their own roadmap to reopening. It’s a far simpler affair, consisting essentially of just two steps. Step one, the Government provides a £50 million fund to ensure all venues can survive until October, the earliest many envision being able to put on viable gigs. Step two, they fuck off out of it".

UK music venues need an immediate cash injection of £50 million from the government to prevent a wave of permanent venue closures across the summer, Music Venue Trust has warned. MVT has launched its #saveourvenues campaign in April, raising £2 million which saved 140 cultural spaces so far, but the Trust warns that the government must provide the injection to prevent lasting damage to the live sector, Music Week reports. Trade body UK Music predicts that the coronavirus shutdown will destroy a staggering £900 million of the estimated £1.1 billion that the UK’s live industry contributes to the economy each year.

Concert venues and music businesses in Nashville are beginning to rebuild after being hit by several tornadoes Tuesday morning, Billboard reports, While popular concert venue the Basement East saw major damage, many other East Nashville-based music companies are also grappling with the aftermath of the destruction. Collective Artist Management (whose clients include Clint Black, Sara Evans and Edwin McCain) and Dualtone Records (the label home to the Lumineers, the Lone Bellow, Shovels & Rope and Amos Lee) both witnessed extreme loss. Craig Dunn, vp Collective Artist Management shared news on Facebook: “I was overwhelmed when I saw the devastation and damage to this beloved neighborhood in our great city. My sadness and dismay were quickly replaced by hope and optimism as hordes of volunteers showed up with snacks, water, and two hands willing to help clear debris. I DEFINITELY Believe in Nashville”.

A series of deadly tornados destroyed the popular Nashville music venue Basement East Monday night. Basement East’s co-owner, Mike Grimes told the Rolling Stone a tornado struck Basement East at approximately 1:15 a.m. local time, shortly after a Bernie Sanders benefit concert had concluded, so nobody was hurt. Grimes says the "venue is pretty much a total loss”. The Basement East opened in 2015 and had welcomed artists including Best Coast, Archers of Loaf, Lucy Dacus, Pinegrove, and The Lemon Twigs. The venue’s upcoming calendar promised shows from Delta Spirit, Hamilton Leithauser, Torres, Frances Quinlan, and The Airborne Toxic Event.

A report in 2015 revealed that the UK had lost 35 per cent of its live music venues in the previous eight years because, on its own, the venue is but a solitary minnow squaring up against a school of sharks... But when their isolated individual voices combined with the help of the Music Venues Trust, they were saved - NME's columnist Mark Beaumont writes, defeatistically, about UK's exit from the EU, and how UK's clubs were saved on the very principle of unity.

Small venues are important not only to touring musicians and gig-goers, but also to the fabric of our culture and to the future of young talent, NME writes in a lovely article about the Independent Venue Week (being held till February 2 in the UK, and one week in July in the US). “I was playing in places like this for about 10 years” this year’s Independent Venue Week Ambassador Anna Calvi tells NME - “I wasn’t confident when I first went out and started singing in a three-piece punk band. Over those 10 years, I became much more of a singer and completely changed the style of music that I wanted to make. You have to play live to find out what turns you on”. So, long live small venues!!!

230 small and medium-sized venues in England and Wales will see a 50% reduction in business rates, a fee which is charged to most non-domestic properties. It should save each venue an average of £7,500 a year, according to the Independent Venues Trust and make it more likely that acts still have small spaces to start their careers.

Event organizers from Hydro club in Glasgow have banned numerous accessories ahead of Slipknot gig on Saturday, including spiked collars, large belt buckles, and large chain wallets. The band's promoters have requested similar restrictions at previous gigs, and fans were quick this time to criticize and make fun of these regulations.

Independent music venues in Britain should receive the same support as the ballet or opera, musician Anna Calvi said - “Just because it’s music that is played with guitars, why is it any different to a place like the ballet or opera?". The musician believes that venues which predominantly focus on live music need to be protected at a time when a third of smaller venues report they are struggling.

The historic live music venue the Borderline in London's West End is to close this summer, due tu rising rents in the West End, licensing pressures and the redevelopment of the building where it is housed. The Borderline is one of the last remaining live music venues in Soho, after the closure of the Astoria […]

Madison Square Garden Company started a project in Las Vegas which, when finished, will be the most up-to-date concert venue in the world. It will host 157,000 ultra-directional speakers, a three-and-a-half-acre spherical ultra-high-res video screen and vibrating floors in a enormous dome built from scratch. Should be open for New Year's eve in 2020. Photos […]