The O2 Brixton Academy has been staging performances since 1929.

In December last year a seriously unfortunate and tragic incident took place which stole the lives of two young people and since January 2023 the iconic music venue has been closed. The Met police are now ordering permanent closure of the entire building, which will have a detrimental effect on the UK’s live music scene; The AGM (Academy Music Group) have co-operated fully with the requests made by Lambeth Council and the Metropolitan Police since January when the venue licence was temporarily suspended - but still the Met Police have requested for Lambeth Council to revoke the licence of the venue permanently. Resulting in the closure of South London’s beautiful and iconic music venue. This would not only be a devastating loss to live music, but to the Brixton community and local economy.

Whilst the news of the crush in December 2022 resulting in the deaths of Rebecca Ikumelo, 33, and Gaby Hutchinson, 23 is hugely tragic, this was an extremely rare incident. 

The O2 Brixton Academy entertains up to 4921 standing guests a night and last year maintained stage performances for over 150 concerts. Over fifty live albums have been recorded at the venue by artists including The Sex Pistols, Gary Newman, The Pixies, Groove Armada, Inspiral Carpets, Kasabian, Chase and Status, Public Broadcasting Service and New Order. The O2 Brixton Academy has been voted the NME Best Venue 12 times since 1994.

Our condolences go out to and honour the grief of the families of Rebecca Ikumelo, 33, and Gaby Hutchinson, 23 and my hope is that with people power and the genuine love of live music, that the O2 Brixton Academy is given a fair chance to put right what went wrong that night and continue its place of being one of the UK’s top mid size music venues.

Please sign and share to play your part in protecting UK’s music venues and support the AGM in this battle against closing yet another historical music venue in London and let’s hope artists can take to the beautiful venues stage again as soon as possible.