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> Live performance revenue reached $329 million, well above pre-Covid levels. Is that inflation-adjusted? And as the article points out, very little of that is

> Live performance revenue reached $329 million, well above pre-Covid levels. Is that inflation-adjusted? And as the article points out, very little of that is local talent, so it's likely some of that's due to the cost of tickets. As someone who lived in NZ (although Wellington) for 10 years until last year, the local music scene was there, but at least in Wellington, the change in the 10 years I was there was considerable: The earthquake in 2016 progressively caused several venues on Cuba Street to close due to building regulations, and Covid was a significant shock as well, with some of the smaller (although most places in Wellington were small!) gig rooms / bars / breweries that would often host bands closing. There was still Valhalla, San Fran, The Rogue & Vagabond and others, but it just didn't feel as much was going on other than for things like Cuba Dupa street festival, etc, or the Jazz weekends that would be held. As the article points out, this is not localised to NZ, it's happening in Australia and the UK as well in terms of venues/pubs closing and live music not being quite the draw it once was because of that.

rvba 1mo ago
No idea how it looked in New Zealand, but after covid "ended"* there were a lot of people who simply wanted to go out - after spending so much time indoors. I suspect that people went out more in 2023-2025, but then they reversed to the mean + economic impacts (of money printing everywhere) hit. * by the way, did covid officially ever end? the new variants seem to be still there, but it just stopped being covered by media after Russia invaded Ukraine)
- sitharus 1mo ago
  New Zealand locked down less than a lot of countries, but other than people with health problems I see no signs that people aren't going out any more due to Covid. However due to other reasons people definitely have less money for discretionary activities, especially the youth. And no, Covid never ended. It's still here, it's still killing and disabling people, but due to vaccines and antivirals it's less prevalent than it was.
  - deleted 1mo ago
    [deleted]
  - mvdtnz 1mo ago
    What? NZ had one of the strictest, most prolonged and most extreme lockdown regimes in the world. Especially Auckland.
    - javascriptfan69 1mo ago
      Not really. The international border quarantine was quite extreme, but the rest of the country was (mostly) business as normal.
      - Taniwha 1mo ago
        Yeah, we had a very strict initial lockdown, and closed the border, once the number of cases went to 0 we opened up again, we then had regional lockdowns after cases broke the border quarantine.
      - mvdtnz 1mo ago
        Our level 4 lockdown was scored at 95/100 ("extreme") by the Oxford Coronavirus Government Response Tracker. Our border lockdowns and MIQ system were extreme and very prolonged stretching into 2022 and even impacted returning citizens.
        javascriptfan69 1mo ago
        Our level 4 lockdown didn't last very long. The strictness index (which is what I'm assuming you're referring to) varied over time as the response changed.
        mvdtnz 1mo ago
        The claim I was initially responding to was, "New Zealand locked down less than a lot of countries". Not specifically length. NZ lockdown was especially strict in some regards (level 4, border lockdown) and especially prolonged in others (Auckland lockdown, border and MIQ).
- kurthr 1mo ago
  In the US deaths peaked at >450k in 2021 and then fell <80k in 2023. They have roughly halved each year since (on track for ~10k this year. There are about 30-40k deaths each year due to influenza so this isn't really news any more. Most everyone is vaccinated except the young who seem to have relatively mild infections. Of course there are probably excess cardiac deaths due to immune response, but that's even smaller and much more difficult to measure or determine cause for.
  - BLKNSLVR 1mo ago
    Did the US reach 450k deaths in a single year? Wow, and there are still those who call it a hoax? Nothing much to be done about those who refuse free education I guess. I also figure they just have less empathy for their families.
    - dosisking 1mo ago
      > Did the US reach 450k deaths in a single year? Wow, and there are still those who call it a hoax? Miraculously, there were 0 flu deaths that year
      - abanana 1mo ago
        There's a wide spectrum from "outright hoax" to "very slightly exaggerated" (which is the point where I sit on this subject), but it all tends to get lumped together and criticised as one. I've always said I'm sure any politics university course must be based on the art of exaggeration. It's just what politicians do, so there's no way this one subject could be the sole one where they didn't. To make any point, they'll cherry-pick the least reliable studies, make examples of the outliers to imply they're the norm, use statistical obfuscation, etc. Graphs in the news were blatant - taking a line graph that was fluctuating up and down, and extrapolating by continuing the last tiny upward movement into a long straight line upwards, entirely ignoring the story the graph was really telling us. Misclassifying at least some flu deaths as Covid (due to the way symptoms were diagnosed at speed by a single doctor each time, all need for checking removed) appears to have been one way the figures were at least slightly inflated. It was clear throughout how politicians were determined to find the data to confirm the initial predictions. Slight exaggeration is far removed from "hoax", but is still a bad thing for anyone who's like to know the real figures.
- inigyou 1mo ago
  In New Zealand there were only a few weeks of lockdown followed by much time when people could go out without any fear. COVID never ended (we chose that). The pandemic turned to an endemic, which is a way of saying that the plan is now natural selection, as everyone will get infected (most people already have been). The death rates have somewhat reduced, but not to the extent that it's as harmless as the cold. Essentially it's now a particularly nastseasonal flu strain. If you're vaccinated, no you aren't, because COVID mutates as fast as any other flu and you last got vaccinated for it years ago.
  - phyalow 1mo ago
    Auckland was locked down for months
    - EdwardDiego 1mo ago
      Initially it was locked down the same as the rest of NZ. And then it got locked down again a few months after the initial lockdowns, due to a Delta outbreak, the most lethal variant of Covid. It wasn't locked down for months on end while the rest of NZ was having fun in the sun, it was locked down the same as the rest of us initially, then it wasn't, then it was locked down again because a strain with a high lethality was present in the city. That strain was first detected in a rest home where it killed multiple elderly people. The second lockdown wasn't for shits and giggles. I really struggle to understand why Aucklanders don't understand this, and fixate on "We were locked down for months, unlike the rest of New Zealand, and it was really bad for our local economy" when the second lockdown was to save lives in Auckland and the lives of other Kiwis, because if it had spread from Auckland, there would have been plenty more dead Grandmas around the motu.
      - inigyou 1mo ago
        I don't understand this "we were locked down for months but being locked down for months doesn't count if there's a good reason." Were they locked down or weren't they?
berghoffer 1mo ago
[dead]
Melatonic 1mo ago
There's a venue in NZ called "San Fran" ? That's pretty cool
- DinosaurArms 1mo ago
  First it was a massage/sauna place called The San Francisco Bathhouse, and then it kept that name when it turned to a live venue. Now it is just San Fran.
- dosisking 1mo ago
  San Fran, who turned out to be a man Flo had to go, I couldn't go with the flow
ColdStream 1mo ago
Yep, here in Oz (Victoria) the scene is struggling. You see some glimpses trying to keep it going but it is rare. Sometimes it feels like all we have is King Gizzard occasionally and then nothing but DJ's and cover bands to fill the gaps at the local RSL. Places like The Croxton still put on a great spread however. It has been about 8 years since I was last in Wellington, it seemed to still have some stuff going for it but it was also clear that the decline was setting in.
- pavo-etc 1mo ago
  Strong disagree. There are many venues playing local bands in Melbourne all the time. The Retreat, the Corner Hotel, Workers Club, the Esplanade, Northcote Social and Northcote Theatre, Billboards. I can't speak to what the scene was like 10 years ago, but to say that its rare feels very wrong to me.
  - ColdStream 1mo ago
    Yeah fair call. I think it is just the vision looking back on what it used to be like.
    - angled 1mo ago
      Same for electronic music in Australia - well off context here but fora such as spraci, ITM, and then its sibling FL were great for discovering and connecting with new music and people.
  - BLKNSLVR 1mo ago
    I think the difference might be that, whilst there is still a fair bit on offer if you look closely enough, you now have to look closely enough rather than just being able to stumble upon it. Same as the 'modern music sucks' argument. Great modern music is there if you do the work, but if you're passive you'll only get the clones of what was popular (via payola) yesterday.
- BLKNSLVR 1mo ago
  Praise be to King Gizzard!
ErigmolCt 1mo ago
I think the revenue number needs a lot more context for exactly this reason

rvba 1mo ago

No idea how it looked in New Zealand, but after covid "ended"* there were a lot of people who simply wanted to go out - after spending so much time indoors. I suspect that people went out more in 2023-2025, but then they reversed to the mean + economic impacts (of money printing everywhere) hit. * by the way, did covid officially ever end? the new variants seem to be still there, but it just stopped being covered by media after Russia invaded Ukraine)

sitharus 1mo ago
New Zealand locked down less than a lot of countries, but other than people with health problems I see no signs that people aren't going out any more due to Covid. However due to other reasons people definitely have less money for discretionary activities, especially the youth. And no, Covid never ended. It's still here, it's still killing and disabling people, but due to vaccines and antivirals it's less prevalent than it was.
- deleted 1mo ago
  [deleted]
- mvdtnz 1mo ago
  What? NZ had one of the strictest, most prolonged and most extreme lockdown regimes in the world. Especially Auckland.
  - javascriptfan69 1mo ago
    Not really. The international border quarantine was quite extreme, but the rest of the country was (mostly) business as normal.
    - Taniwha 1mo ago
      Yeah, we had a very strict initial lockdown, and closed the border, once the number of cases went to 0 we opened up again, we then had regional lockdowns after cases broke the border quarantine.
    - mvdtnz 1mo ago
      Our level 4 lockdown was scored at 95/100 ("extreme") by the Oxford Coronavirus Government Response Tracker. Our border lockdowns and MIQ system were extreme and very prolonged stretching into 2022 and even impacted returning citizens.
      - javascriptfan69 1mo ago
        Our level 4 lockdown didn't last very long. The strictness index (which is what I'm assuming you're referring to) varied over time as the response changed.
        mvdtnz 1mo ago
        The claim I was initially responding to was, "New Zealand locked down less than a lot of countries". Not specifically length. NZ lockdown was especially strict in some regards (level 4, border lockdown) and especially prolonged in others (Auckland lockdown, border and MIQ).
kurthr 1mo ago
In the US deaths peaked at >450k in 2021 and then fell <80k in 2023. They have roughly halved each year since (on track for ~10k this year. There are about 30-40k deaths each year due to influenza so this isn't really news any more. Most everyone is vaccinated except the young who seem to have relatively mild infections. Of course there are probably excess cardiac deaths due to immune response, but that's even smaller and much more difficult to measure or determine cause for.
- BLKNSLVR 1mo ago
  Did the US reach 450k deaths in a single year? Wow, and there are still those who call it a hoax? Nothing much to be done about those who refuse free education I guess. I also figure they just have less empathy for their families.
  - dosisking 1mo ago
    > Did the US reach 450k deaths in a single year? Wow, and there are still those who call it a hoax? Miraculously, there were 0 flu deaths that year
    - abanana 1mo ago
      There's a wide spectrum from "outright hoax" to "very slightly exaggerated" (which is the point where I sit on this subject), but it all tends to get lumped together and criticised as one. I've always said I'm sure any politics university course must be based on the art of exaggeration. It's just what politicians do, so there's no way this one subject could be the sole one where they didn't. To make any point, they'll cherry-pick the least reliable studies, make examples of the outliers to imply they're the norm, use statistical obfuscation, etc. Graphs in the news were blatant - taking a line graph that was fluctuating up and down, and extrapolating by continuing the last tiny upward movement into a long straight line upwards, entirely ignoring the story the graph was really telling us. Misclassifying at least some flu deaths as Covid (due to the way symptoms were diagnosed at speed by a single doctor each time, all need for checking removed) appears to have been one way the figures were at least slightly inflated. It was clear throughout how politicians were determined to find the data to confirm the initial predictions. Slight exaggeration is far removed from "hoax", but is still a bad thing for anyone who's like to know the real figures.
inigyou 1mo ago
In New Zealand there were only a few weeks of lockdown followed by much time when people could go out without any fear. COVID never ended (we chose that). The pandemic turned to an endemic, which is a way of saying that the plan is now natural selection, as everyone will get infected (most people already have been). The death rates have somewhat reduced, but not to the extent that it's as harmless as the cold. Essentially it's now a particularly nastseasonal flu strain. If you're vaccinated, no you aren't, because COVID mutates as fast as any other flu and you last got vaccinated for it years ago.
- phyalow 1mo ago
  Auckland was locked down for months
  - EdwardDiego 1mo ago
    Initially it was locked down the same as the rest of NZ. And then it got locked down again a few months after the initial lockdowns, due to a Delta outbreak, the most lethal variant of Covid. It wasn't locked down for months on end while the rest of NZ was having fun in the sun, it was locked down the same as the rest of us initially, then it wasn't, then it was locked down again because a strain with a high lethality was present in the city. That strain was first detected in a rest home where it killed multiple elderly people. The second lockdown wasn't for shits and giggles. I really struggle to understand why Aucklanders don't understand this, and fixate on "We were locked down for months, unlike the rest of New Zealand, and it was really bad for our local economy" when the second lockdown was to save lives in Auckland and the lives of other Kiwis, because if it had spread from Auckland, there would have been plenty more dead Grandmas around the motu.
    - inigyou 1mo ago
      I don't understand this "we were locked down for months but being locked down for months doesn't count if there's a good reason." Were they locked down or weren't they?

berghoffer 1mo ago

[dead]

Melatonic 1mo ago

There's a venue in NZ called "San Fran" ? That's pretty cool

DinosaurArms 1mo ago
First it was a massage/sauna place called The San Francisco Bathhouse, and then it kept that name when it turned to a live venue. Now it is just San Fran.
dosisking 1mo ago
San Fran, who turned out to be a man Flo had to go, I couldn't go with the flow

ColdStream 1mo ago

Yep, here in Oz (Victoria) the scene is struggling. You see some glimpses trying to keep it going but it is rare. Sometimes it feels like all we have is King Gizzard occasionally and then nothing but DJ's and cover bands to fill the gaps at the local RSL. Places like The Croxton still put on a great spread however. It has been about 8 years since I was last in Wellington, it seemed to still have some stuff going for it but it was also clear that the decline was setting in.

pavo-etc 1mo ago
Strong disagree. There are many venues playing local bands in Melbourne all the time. The Retreat, the Corner Hotel, Workers Club, the Esplanade, Northcote Social and Northcote Theatre, Billboards. I can't speak to what the scene was like 10 years ago, but to say that its rare feels very wrong to me.
- ColdStream 1mo ago
  Yeah fair call. I think it is just the vision looking back on what it used to be like.
  - angled 1mo ago
    Same for electronic music in Australia - well off context here but fora such as spraci, ITM, and then its sibling FL were great for discovering and connecting with new music and people.
- BLKNSLVR 1mo ago
  I think the difference might be that, whilst there is still a fair bit on offer if you look closely enough, you now have to look closely enough rather than just being able to stumble upon it. Same as the 'modern music sucks' argument. Great modern music is there if you do the work, but if you're passive you'll only get the clones of what was popular (via payola) yesterday.
BLKNSLVR 1mo ago
Praise be to King Gizzard!

ErigmolCt 1mo ago

I think the revenue number needs a lot more context for exactly this reason