Venuewatch: MelloMello

Bad news from Liverpool: MelloMello has been forced out of business as rents on Slater Street become untenable. Here's their farewell statement:

To our wonderful community,

It is with great sadness that we must announce that as of Monday 22nd September 2014, MelloMello CIC closes it’s doors and ceases to trade from it’s Slater Street home.

Despite our best efforts we have been unable to meet the huge increase in business rates imposed on us two years ago, and have battled the financial difficulties that several burglaries and the ever-evolving fabric of the city centre have incurred. We are deeply saddened to be closing our doors, but also truly proud of what has been achieved within these walls.

MelloMello began life in 2007 as a completely volunteer-led organisation, in a derelict space, and has grown organically through the hard work of it’s staff and the community into a catalytic creative hub, a grassroots cultural monument, and a welcoming and warm environment, brimming and buzzing with energy, passion, art, music, dance, comedy, food, drink, laughter and love.

We thank our amazing staff, for everything they do, their talents and eccentricities, the wonderful support network they have built up, and the welcoming environment they provide. We thank every single creative individual who has walked through our doors and given us beautiful, raucous and thought-provoking art and performances. And we thank you, the community of Liverpool, for whom we endeavoured to provide such a place, for your fantastic support, the contribution of your own creativity and many wonderful characters over the years. You have all helped to create something truly unique.

As for the future…… watch this space.

With all our love, MelloMello

The cycle of enthusiasts taking over a derelict space, improving it, sparking a revitalisation of the area, attracting other tenants, pushing up rents and getting pushed out by the new high rents is an over-familiar one in Liverpool.

There's a slate of planned gigs which, presumably, won't happen now; the optimistic "watch this space" (or, presumably, watch another space as the Slater Street site gets transformed into a generic bar or trouser shop) holds out some hope.

[In 2012, the council nearly sank the venture

Venuewatch: MelloMello

MelloMello is something of a beacon in Liverpool's nightlife: a community venture which is run as a non-profit; a genuinely creative hub employing around two dozen people; a well-run, popular and safe nightspot in a city where some bars are run by people whom you might not feel comfortable around.

So, something for the city to celebrate, right?

Not quite, it turns out: as the Tories and Lib Dems squeeze local finances, the council is squeezing MelloMello.

Up until now, the place has enjoyed an 80% discretionary waiver on council tax, an act of enabling generosity that the council is now going to pull.

Talking to SevenStreets, MelloMello's Rob Longson explains that the company couldn't afford that hike without jacking up the prices it charges to the bands and artists who use its spaces, and that it wouldn't do that:

What might happen is that MelloMello’s building will have the lease taken on by a company that can afford it. What kind of company do you think that will be? A small, independent CIC which has built a business out of nothing? No. Probably the opposite.

It wouldn't be the first time that one of the very venues which sits are the heart of the tales Liverpool City Council likes to tell about the place gets driven away. Let's not forget how much better, say, having an Australian-themed chain pub where Trading Places used to serve tea and give bands rehearsal space worked towards generating that vibrant culture LCC tries to sell on, or the dozens of other examples of similar happening in the last twenty years.

There's a petition. Let's try to get the City to change its mind.