Today (August 18), Senator Chuck Schumer of New York held a press conference outside the All Right of Brooklyn venue Baby to announce that he will be co-sponsoring the Save Our Stages Act. Among the guest speakers at the event was James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem. Watch the press conference below.
In addition to local owners and activists of the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA), Schumer spoke about the importance of independent locations in New York and in the United States. “These places need to survive,” he said. “It’s like saying, ‘Well, we can do without it,’ it’s like saying you can do without your liver or your right arm, we really need them.”
Murphy talked about the importance of locations as places that encourage diverse scenes and sounds. He mentioned that these locations provide jobs, pointing to his own time work noise at Maxwell’s in Hoboken and Brownies in Manhattan.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, locations across the country have been forced to close. Ninety percent of NIVA members said that if the shutdown lasts six months or more and they do not receive federal aid, they will be forced to close permanently.
The Save Our Stages Act would provide locations with subsidies that could be used to pay employees, rental housing, utilities, PPE, and other business expenses. “I will do everything I can to do this because it is so important,” Schumer said.
Read “How Independent Music Halls Fight for Their Existence”.
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