Seen in the Wall Street Journal:
British pop star Lily Allen was supposed to perform at the MTV Video Music Awards last weekend and then head to the West Coast for the week of sold-out concerts she had booked. Instead, she spent this past week at home in London.
The reason: The chart-topping singer can’t get into the U.S. American authorities took away her immigration visa last month.
This fall, the British aren’t coming. Immigration restrictions are stopping some popular United Kingdom acts from reaching U.S. borders. At least three anticipated tours by British artists scheduled for this month alone have been called off or pushed back because of musicians’ visa problems. That is on top of at least 10 scuttled tours by buzzed-about British acts in the last year.
Part of the problem, immigration specialists say: The traditional visa system isn’t set up to cope with the new face of popular music. To get into the U.S., many foreign music acts need to secure a document known as the “P-1″-class visa. This visa requires acts to prove that they have been “internationally recognized” for a “sustained and substantial” amount of time.
And, of course with new media at work, and the speed with which groups can gain or lose popularity, all aggravated by immigration paranoia,… well, it seems like a musician is unlikely to get in unless he/she/they is/are a Big Name owned by a Big Record Label with a few platinum albums to their name.
You’d think that with all the tax dollars collected from us, Homeland Security could have learned how to balance the need for security with the common sense of welcoming visitors…and their Euros/Yen/… to the country, as well as keeping up with developments in business and entertainment.