Hot Dogs, Mad Bad Law and the pin sharp snapper....

Legal Hot Dog anyone?

Not that long ago, The Hat  regularly used to slip down a rather shabby London side street, past the tradesman's entrance to the Posh Paisley shop 'Liberty of London', the piles of flattened cardboard boxes and discarded polystyrene and push open the very tatty door of a tiny property that looked as though it had been abandoned many years ago and nobody had told the landlord. It has had a coat of paint since then and the travelled detectives amongst you will know that the street is Kingly Street and the premises are called 'Ain't Nothin' But'. Although, like the Tardis, it is small on the outside, the inside is somewhat less dramatic and spacious. Indeed, there is barely room to swing one of Cozy's offspring let alone a full grown moggie. What it does have however, just like The Doctor's Transport, is that wondrous magical ability to whisk you away to another planet. It is a Blues Bar.

The lifting of some of the Red Tape surrounding the staging of live music in small venues last week, took The Hat directly back to that cramped, crowded, hot and sweaty venue. Conjure this. You have managed to wriggle yourself into a space where you can see the artist – perhaps Dave Kelly brilliantly sliding his way through some classics – and suddenly from stage right appear smiley staff bearing several plates of hot dogs each neatly rolled in a white napkin. They are Free. You accept one. You beam with delight, scoff it appreciatively and Dave plays on. Ok. Being a smart lot, you are ahead of me. It was Five To Eleven and the only reason Dave was able to carry on sliding down to the Crossroads was because Ain't Nothin' But, with its culinary benificence had, at a ketchup stroke, miraculously transformed itself into A Food-Serving-Restaurant-Type-Premises. Consequently, new and more sensible music licencing arrangements were triggered, nobody missed a beat and the band could play on....

Although this is just one example, to say that this event was unusual and plain silly would be to miss the fact that rule bending like this was going on all over the country. It was a daft law with a smart avoidance clause. Indeed some of you will remember the day when at half past ten, pub landlords took away your beer and put the chairs on the tables all round you, asking loudly all the while if you did not have a Home or a Mother, Sir..... on the other hand if you'd like to go to the next door bar and eat some rubbish chips in a basket you could take your beer with you, Sir........

We've grown up a bit since then and whilst the drinking licence laws have been edged into the real world many of the laws covering live music for small venues have remained locked in some absurd time warp for decades. How many in your band Mister? Three. That's tricky. Do you have an electric guitar? Oh dear, not sure about that! When do you want to play? Sorry can't get it sorted by then Mister. This month's reprieve was long overdue. The fact that it took a private member's bill to trigger the Live Music Act says a lot about just how seriously successive governments took this situation, despite determined lobbying by the venues, musicians and the Musicians Union. The ever-present Noise Abatement Society and the cut-off sensor hidden in the Glitter Ball carried on regardless, licence fees escalated and the very venues that provide the life-blood for local music were slowly asphyxiated into white flag Karaoke and Musak submission. The Hat once spent some reckless time in Austin Texas. They have 200 live music venues. It slipped my mind while I was there to ask about the music licencing laws but they do a hell of a hot dog at two in the morning and nobody stole my chair..

Now, at last, premises with a capacity of up to 200 will no longer need a licence for live music and small community venues and pubs will be free of much of the ridiculous bureaucracy that has shackled them. If you want the full details, check the MU for their really useful kit. The MU and PRS research tells us that pubs without featured live music are three times more likely to close than those with live music. You don't need to be banjo player to work that one out....

While we are raising glasses to the power of common sense and persistence, as someone who once got paid to raise a lens or two, The Hat would like you to join him in taking an extra swig on behalf of photographer Tony Winfield. Well known in Hebden and in blues circles around the country for consistently delivering superb music photographs, Tony has always reminded The Hat of his favourite quiet musicians, often bass players, who gig after gig, stand there without fuss or flash and deliver brilliance as though it were an everyday matter . You hardly notice them until their work is done. Tony is currently lying down for a bit whilst the NHS give him a service. He has, predictably, sent us a picture from his hospital window. We know and expect that he will be back up and pin sharp at a Festival near you, anytime soon.....

Pip Pip Tony!

The Man in The Hat

Pic of  ANB by Pete Elliott