CarolC

Nice idea, but most of those sorts of places (in the UK at least) are not so large that one side of the room is far enough away from the other to lead to much reduction in sound levels. Air is a very efficient conductor of sound; it's only walls & double glazing between you and the sound source that will make a significant difference to sound levels over short distances.

I sadly find music instrusive in most of the places that it is played, due to excessive volumes and bass levels. Even in 'family pubs' I the volume can actually be painfully loud. And UK society seems to dumbly accept this as the norm.

Repeating what I said in part 1 of this thread, this trend has made such 'social' occassions of birthday parties, wedding receptions etc more of a trial than an pleasure. I usually come away with a sense of an 'missed opportunity' i.e. it would have been lovely to chat to old friends, if we hadn't spent the evening being acoutically terrorised by a deaf/socially inept DJ!!

Julie B