Cait Stoddard February 23rd, 2023 - 1:32 PM
According to nme.com several artists and music industry figures have spoken about the damage that can happen to international touring if a 260 per cent price hike for U.S visas is allowed to go through and some of the artists are encouraging music fans to speak up and help stop this issue.
Earlier this month, it was reported that the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was planning to raise touring visa fees for foreign acts by more than 250 per cent and laying out the cost of acts arriving in the US to perform temporarily, would increase from the current rate of $460 (£375.23) to $1,615 (£1,317), with a longer term work visa jumping from $460 (£375.23) to $1,655 (£1,349).
The news caught the attention from the international music scene ,with the new measures proving preventative for both new and established artists and now more have come forward to call for action. It could lead up to an increase in the cost of gigs and tickets for international acts playing in the U.S.
Music fans and industry workers have until March 6 to vote against the move on the Federal Register website. Also with those in the industry also invited to fill in this survey from the Featured Artists Coalition.
This month the Leicester band Easy Life cancelled their upcoming US tour due to the increased prices. When speaking NME, frontman Murray Matravers how “bleak” a picture there already was without the “crippling” massive visa price hike.
“We just couldn’t afford it – it’s literally as simple as that. We’ve done a proper tour of the US once before with a little pretend tour before that, all pre-COVID. It’s all changed so much. The cost of visas is crazy, you have to hire a legal representative to do all the forms and their fees have gone right up.”
The singer continued: “In the UK now, we do reasonably-sized shows with a full production. We initially put the budget in to our management to a similar kind of show in the US, but a little scaled down for the venues. We didn’t want to just show up with our instruments because it would have felt like a massive step back and we wouldn’t want to give our US fans a really shit experience compared to what we can offer in the UK.”
Matravers adds: “We scaled things right back to us in a bandwagon with a skeleton crew, and we still couldn’t afford to do it. This isn’t because we couldn’t sell tickets – we forecast it to sell out – but even if it sold out, we’d still be losing about £30,000. At this stage in our career, we don’t have £30,000 to lose.”
Simone Marie Butler is a DJ, radio host, Featured Artists Coalition patron and bassist for Primal Scream. Speaking to NME, Butler asked for action as “the USA remains the biggest music market in the world”.
“The government have been silent on this, and to be honest if I wasn’t already working with the FAC I think I’d struggle to really access the facts on what’s going on. “The proposed 260 per cent price increase for work visas will be prohibitively expensive for new and emerging bands, as well as small to medium artists and above too. Many bands simply can’t go over because financially it won’t work unless they are prepared to make a loss. The increase of such a large amount seems unprecedented and unrealistic.”
Buter pointed that showcase festivals like SXSW would become out of bounds for artists around the world and even neighbouring Canada, and that this would prevent new talent from developing and growing their audience.
