I Thank you immensely for posting and taking this stance and it's one of the many reasons you're held in such high esteem by most everyone. I stopped following some of my most favorite performers and band acts for the same reckless disregard they employed with flammable theatrics on small stages. Not only would they fail to bring along a simple kitchen CO-2 extinguisher or set aside a bucket of sand or water, they invariably didn't even know where the house extinguishers. When I found myself having to locate and make it easily accessible to the performance area to relieve my own anxiety, I realized I could be thwarting other personnel should a fire break out somewhere else in the space. But here's something else that I think is going unsaid in this discussion. When I asked about the permission policy I was told in different places on different occasions that it was a matter of don't ask, don't tell. In other words, it was an unspoken code that as long as you didn't ask permission you weren't denied permission as long as you weren't bringing in industrial flame throwers. For insurace reasons/costs, Club owners/ Promoters couldn't give you permission so you didn't ask. But for them to lead us to believe they were totally unaware this was or would be taking place in their space is a bit specious in the least especially since many of the acts returned with the very same show in the rotation schedule, bigger and brighter than before. This is not to say all club owners/ Promoters operated this way but I think more than a few did and by presenting themselves as oblivious and thereby shifting the blame all on the performers perpetuates the problem. Your only other option was to go through the headache of getting Fire dept. forms, permission and added liability insurance. Now how many fire breathing acts would bother with that but you'd think they'd have some sort of obvious safety backup at the ready? I can count on one finger how often I encountered that. Then when I heard friends were practicing fire twirling on their tar based roof tops in Williamsburg I thought everyone had gone nuts and gave up that scene altogether.
rb//nyc//bronx//bohemia