KLP & The Rubens Front NSW Music Inquiry, Slam Government For Killing Sydney’s Live Scene

The NSW Government stands accused of mass murder.

The victim? Sydney’s live local music industry. And the hopes and dreams of its artists.

Sydney producer KLP and The Rubens’ drummer Scott Baldwin are among the musos who’ve hit parliament to give testimony, spelling out all the ways the state government’s OTT rules and regulations have brought about Sydney’s slow demise.

Appearing on a panel alongside artist manager Greg Carye and Nicholas Pickard from APRA at the NSW Music Inquiry yesterday, the pair delivered a set of fiery opening statements, ripping into the Berejiklian regime for its lack of f*ck-giving for Sydney’s live scene and culture in general.

“The next generation is deprived of motivation, inspiration and the culture around to pursue a career in the music industry,” KLP told the inquiry (transcribed via The Music).

“Many successful musicians move overseas as well, because there’s not much left here to nourish a creative career. It’s not only hard to make enough income, but there’s just a lack of that inspiration and support systems in place to really progress and make a mark on an international level.”

Baldwin echoed her sentiments, adding that a mass exodus of Sydney musicians to Melbourne is happening because the latter state’s government actually supports and encourages creativity UNLIKE SOME.

“It’s kind of disappointing because the live music scene is just, it’s definitely dying and it sometimes seems dead,” he lamented.

“I used to teach drums as well. I used to use a little bit of an excerpt to inspire [students] and to dream big and stuff. And hearing back my students say, ‘There’s no point’, they’d rather go into other fields and they’re giving up their dreams to play music and their parents also say it’s a dying industry. It’s quite upsetting to me.”

“When [The Rubens] started out touring, we were in a fortunate spot where these venues were open to us and we luckily got some support from triple j and we started having people show up to our shows,” the beatman continued.

“We went on to grow and go overseas… we could be in small international cities and they are just buzzing. I’ve been on the road since 2011 and when you come back to Sydney you can see the dynamic, how much it’s changed. A lot of people talk about it overseas. It’s a big thing. A lot of creatives don’t want to come here.”

The parliamentary inquiry into the state’s music industry has been shining a light on the cooked array of “archaic regulatory conditions” and “red tape” that are currently “decimating” the city’s live music culture and “kneecapping” the careers of its emerging artists.

You can have a gander at just some such incidents chronicled meticulously in our dedicated FFS Sydney Feed right here.