Yes, Howard, there are copyright issues. Strictly speaking the club would need to be paying royalties if copyrighted material were performed, but the process is not as clean in the US as it is Over There. You are expected to satisfy the demands of all the shakedown -- er, excuse me, performing rights -- agencies (i.e. ASCAP, BMI and that new one I can't remember) but there is no statutory license that does it all with one stop.
On the other hand I suppose you would be under the radar (for a while), but then again there is that Doing The Right Thing idea as well...
Which is why I can't find any such similar gig in my own area and why I'll be double-dog-danged if I'm going to go to all the hassle of starting one myself.
-Glenn