For 18 years 505 has been a vital member of Sydney’s live music and theatre landscape. Over the years we have had many iterations and adventures from the early warehouse days to our internationally renowned Cleveland Street club Venue 505, and our beautiful award winning Old 505 Theatre in Newtown. In that time we have supported tens of thousands of artists in their careers and welcomed hundreds of thousands of people through our doors. Through all of those years 505 has remained fiercely independent, staunchly artist run and vehemently community minded.
The past decade has been incredibly difficult for Sydney venues from lockouts, archaic regulation, pressures of gentrification and rising cost of business; but nothing has compared to the impacts we have felt this past two years. We have worked hard to reimagine our offering, our business model and to just keep going. We teamed up with our friends at Sydney Fringe to share space, reduce risk and safeguard the venue; we have had tremendous support from the building trustees and Government that kept us going for the past 24 months, but the reality of operating in this environment for a third year is simply untenable.
The new year’s wave of Omicron has thrown our sectors plans for recovery out the window, exposed our fragility and to be frank, is just too much. So we have made the decision to wrap up 505 and stop presenting work at the Newtown venue, as such the last Acoustic Ritual gigs will be in March and then we will hit stop and take a long breath.
We don’t know what the future holds for 505, it is unlikely we will have a permanent bricks and mortar space again, certainly not in the near future. I am sure we will pop up here and there and we will of course continue to find ways to provide gigs to artists and space to creatives where we can. Cameron will get back to playing the bass, teaching at the Conservatorium and is embarking on a PHD; and Kerri will continue to champion the independent arts sector and help make Sydney the city we all want it to be.
Thank you to all the wonderful people who have supported our venues, our programs and our dream.
All our love Cameron Undy and Kerri Glasscock