Live music venue the Newtown Social Club has announced that it is closing its doors, blaming the "current regulatory climate in Sydney" for making the business unsustainable.
The King Street venue will shut down on April 23, the club announced on Facebook on Wednesday night, in a message that was shared thousands of times and attracted hundreds of messages of dismay from live music fans overnight.
"Whilst the live music part of the business was a resounding success, the current regulatory climate in Sydney and the inherent challenges therein have made it unsustainable," the club said.
"We look forward to exploring new opportunities in the future.
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"We'd like to thank our amazing staff, as well all the artists, industry, media and punters that have supported us along the way. We've had so many incredible shows and dealt with so many fantastic people over the last few years."
The club did not elaborate on the "regulatory climate" or its reasons for closure. Fairfax Media has contacted the club's management for further comment.
Those laws imposed a 1.30am lockout and 3am last drinks rules for venues in Kings Cross and the Sydney CBD, and a state-wide ban on takeaway alcohol sales after 10pm. The laws have drawn strong opposition from many licensees in the lockout zones and groups such as Keep Sydney Open, who say the laws have destroyed Sydney's late-night and live-music culture.
In December, the then-premier Mike Baird announced a relaxation of the laws - to a 2am lockout and 3.30am last drinks in venues with live entertainment - for a two-year trial starting this month.
The Newtown Social Club was formerly the iconic Sandringham Hotel, affectionately known as the Sando, an old-school pub and gritty music venue that had hosted live music for three decades before it went into receivership in 2012 with debts of $3.6 million.
At the time, the hotel's impending closure prompted fans to rally on King Street, attracting an estimated crowd of 3000 people including musicians Angry Anderson and Tim Freedman.
Later that year, the venue was purchased by the owners of Melbourne's The Corner Hotel and the Northcote Social Club, and renamed The Newtown Social Club. The bandroom was refurbished upstairs to feature a big corner stage, providing an up-close-and-personal live music experience.
The club's public relations representative sent an email to journalists saying there was a "massive amount of community anger and unrest about this issue, particularly in the music industry, and the [Newtown Social Club] shutting down will bring it to a head and provide a rallying point for regulatory reform in Sydney.
"The hope is that this becomes Sydney's version of Melbourne's 2010 SLAM rallies, in Gladys Berejiklian's first 60 days".
The closure of Sydney's Newtown Social Club is very sad… but feels awfully stunty when PRs send this to journalists: pic.twitter.com/6gn58Bbt4p
— Mark Di Stefano (@MarkDiStef) January 25, 2017
The news came on the same day it was revealed a noise-hating neighbour who recently moved to the inner-west suburb of Glebe had succeeded in shutting down live music in the courtyard of the pub next door after just one complaint, in an incident that has sparked fresh debate about licensing restrictions and NIMBYs.
The Harold Park Hotel in Glebe admitted it has flouted development rules for at least five years by hosting Sunday afternoon live music sessions in its courtyard without permission. A single complaint led to the hotel's mostly acoustic event being muzzled.