Underage Venue Open

Rip It Up, Issue 74, 1 September 1983, Page 4

Underage Venue Open

The Society for the Promotion of Alternatives in Music (SPAM) has opened a venue at 134 Symonds St. It opened this month after considerable work by society members to bring it up to council standards.

SPAM treasurer Jean Williams said it was hoped that the venue would be open day and night in the daytime as a coffee bar and information centre and at night as a music venue. The society also plan to run workshops on skills like rigging up PA systems. SPAM membership costs $5 and entitles the member to the use of the club which is open at present, but will soon go membersonly. SPAM is a non profit organisation registered as an incorporated society and administered by a committee of five. Membership fees going into upgrading facilities and paying for things like security. Membership enquiries to 14 Sefton Ave, Grey Lynn.

Williams said SPAM would be making sure sympathetic, tolerant security staff were hired.

For bands, PA and lights will be supplied and payment will be at musician's rates, $9.30 an hour. Not a fortune, but better than the fat zero you'll get playing at a Mainstreet Buck A Head night. After losing a good deal of money when a previous venue fell through, SPAM is hard up but hopefully membership funds and government grants will allow it to develop.