The new late-night opening hours could help bring Ireland’s ‘decimated’ clubbing scene back from the brink, according to DJ and producer Mark McCabe.
Cabinet today signed off on legislation that will allow nightclubs to remain open until 6am and pubs to open until 12:30 seven nights a week.
Late bars will still need to close at 2:30am and they will need to apply for a late bar permit.
The government hopes the new laws will come into force next year.
On Lunchtime Live this afternoon, ‘Maniac 2000’ DJ and music producer Mark McCabe said the move is a positive step forward.
“I think it definitely is,” he said. “Of course, there is the worry that it will all blow up in everybody’s faces but I think, after the initial flurry of let’s take advantage of this new move, I think things will probably settle down and calm down a little bit and […] allow staggered closing times so it is not just this flurry of people all out on the street at the one time.
“It is something that happens right across Europe and in America and it is not so much of a problem. I think the more freedom you give people, the less likely they are, potentially, to abuse it.”
"There is literally nowhere"
McCabe noted that the club scene around the world is a “whole different culture” to the pub scene – noting that in Ireland, the clubbing culture has been “decimated”.
Looking at Dublin specifically, he said the spaces that set themselves up as hubs for the arts, music and dancing after the economic crash have since been destroyed by the boom in hotel and office development.
“When I say arts, club culture is an art in itself but now, there is literally nowhere,” he said.
A laser show in a nightclub. Image: imageBROKER / Alamy Stock Photo“There is no club in Dublin city centre. There are pubs that have extensions to them which are considered nightclubs but there are no actual clubs.
“If you go to London, if you go to Berlin, if you go to Barcelona, there are clubs. What they do is they open at such and such a time and they close the next morning at 5am or 6am and they run club nights. That’s what they do.
“We don’t have that here anymore. We used to have that with the likes of Tripod or Pod or the Ormond Multimedia Centre back in the day. These were spaces that were reserved for dancing and music.”
"We've rinsed Dublin"
Asked whether Dublin’s club scene can be brought back from the brink, he said: “I hope so.”
“I think what is happening is we have rinsed Dublin of that culture and it is just becoming quite sterile,” he said.
“You can book in, you can stay the night, you can go for a meal, you can have a drink – but it is kind of missing those authentic, real spaces.
“Those spaces don’t exist anymore. The Project Arts Centre is gone. They are all gone so what we are left with is just this functioning city for the purpose of accommodating as opposed to allowing people to actually go out and express themselves and have a good night.”
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