happily announced that he hadn't played his next song for "twenty years"

Ow. I wouldn't actually mind hearing that from a newcomer - particularly someone who'd drifted in from the rest of the pub that evening - but I take it this wasn't.

The trouble is, there are FCs and singarounds which are set up precisely on the basis that anyone can come along and have a go - and anyone does. After a while there's a kind of critical mass of regular anyones, and it starts to seem a bit discourteous or arrogant to learn a song properly before you go up.

My main singaround manages to avoid this - it welcomes newcomers & doesn't frown too hard on songbooks, but there's a core of regulars who are good enough to keep the standard up.