If you're a UK-based musician or band, it's likely you've already heard many decrying the new Kafka-esque complexity of touring in a post-Brexit world. Couple that with an ongoing cost of living crisis and it's entirely understandable why many British musicians might want to hang up their guitars, synths and microphones and find a line of work with a more stable income.
But, the precise magnitude of the damage caused by Brexit has been underscored by a report from UK Music Unwrapped - a new campaign from Face the Music, itself a music-focused sub-brand of the European Movement.
This pro-European movement was in actuality founded by one Winston Churchill back in 1949. Back then, Churchill's aim was to promote European unity in the wake of World War II. Since Brexit, its primary concern has been to advocate for reforging closer ties with the European Union - chiefly by highlighting the damage caused to various British industries.
Music has been particularly affected, as the report - which apes Spotify's hugely popular and currently en vogue 'Unwrapped' presentation - reveals heartbreaking data on the increased costs facing musicians. The full presentation can be viewed below
The data makes for some dispiriting reading, the first slide sets the scene by indicating that 0% of people voting in the 2016 referendum were thinking about how leaving the EU would affect the music industry (this is probably more of an indicative vibe than an actual stat - we're really not sure how you'd quantify that!)
The presentation continues by highlighting some clear and hard-hitting stats - borne out by painstaking research conducted by Face the Music - that 4 in 5 musicians have lost work due to Brexit, with £11,545 of average musician income lost in a post-Brexit world.
59% of musicians say it's now harder to get work in Europe with requests for British acts to tour the EU down by a startling 60%, with European acts performing in the UK down by 40%. Alarming stuff, but something that we hope is now being addressed (or at least, taken seriously) by Britain's newly elected Labour government.
You can support Face the Music's call for the government to break down these barriers for the UK music industry, by signing the organisation's petition here
Further data, revealed by the Face the Music campaign, highlights the effect of Brexit on a wider scale, and are well worth a read.
Check out the full presentation here, and read more about Brexit's continuing longtail impact on the UK music scene here.
