Hackney-based music venue MOTH Club is still fighting to oppose the local council’s demolition plans.
M.O.T.H, which stands for Memorable Order of Tin Hats, is a support network for ex-servicepeople, founded in South Africa in 1927. This network subsequently spread across continents over time, leading to the formation of MOTH Club in Hackney back in 1972. Though for the last ten years, MOTH Club has operated as a live entertainment venue, under the programming of LNZRT, hosting music and comedy gigs, film nights and club events. It’s hosted massive names such as Lady Gaga, Dave Grohl and Jarvis Cocker, as well as artists from a wide range of genres, including King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, IDLES, Caroline Polachek and many more. They also support emerging artists and entertainers.
The issue emerged in September last year, where Hackney Borough Council announced plans to build a block of flats next to the venue on Morning Lane, which prompted MOTH create a petition in protest and reach out to social media for support, fearing noise complaints from the new residents of these flats would cause MOTH’s closure. In November, a second building planning application was passed, again beside the venue, with balconies directly overlooking MOTH’s smoking area.
In an interview with the BBC, MOTH’s general manager Edie Kench-Andrews discussed in further detail the importance of venues like MOTH and the impact these developments might have. She said: “Without venues like the Moth Club, and many others like us, bands wouldn’t lift off the way that they do.” She added: “A building like that getting built next to us will cast such a shadow over everything that we have worked for.
“If we were to get shut down, it would be a monumental difference for the community.
“Without places like us you wouldn’t be listening to half the bands you’re listening to.”
MOTH Club reposted the petition again last Monday, 7 July, urging fans to “keep the pressure on”. They wrote in a caption on Instagram: “Despite the overwhelming public response, Hackney Council has yet to respond to our concerns raised about the two separate planning proposals threatening MOTH Club’s future.”
As of today, 9 July, the petition has over 19,000 signatures and an outpouring of support across music-lovers and ex-servicepeople alike. One comment by Mark Ian on the petition’s website reads: “I am one of the MOTH’s of the MOTH Club (MOTH Club Member). We are still an old soldiers club of which we still hold regular meetings in our room in the upstairs of the club which is out of bounds of the general public
There are very few places veterans can meet and socialise in Hackney […] There is no club like it in London and maybe unique in England.”
Click here to read the petition.
