On June 23, the UK will vote on whether to remain in the European Union. The in-out referendum was one of Prime Minister David Cameron’s promises in the 2015 General Election, ventured in part to stop the extreme right of his Conservative party from fleeing to Eurosceptic UKIP, which has gone from a national joke to an unfortunately legitimate concern over the past few years. (Sound familiar?) Cameron is urging the public to vote Remain, but daily polls show that the vote is incredibly close. We may be headed towards leaving—what’s become known as “Brexit”—even though nobody really knows what the other side of that massive decision looks like.

So far, music has played a fairly minor role in the campaigning. The vote is on the Thursday morning of iconic music festival Glastonbury, and its founders urged their 200,000 punters to register for a postal vote after they were told they couldn’t install polling booths on Worthy Farm. There’s also been the shambolic Bpoplive concert, a tragic attempt by the Leave campaign to influence young people by featuring “some of Britain’s hottest artists as well as speeches from leading personalities and politicians who support leaving the EU.” In a move that by no means illuminates the short-sightedness of the whole sorry affair, none of the acts were actually told that they had been booked to play a political rally, leading two glittering lineups to drop out: first Sigma and Ella Eyre; then Alesha Dixon and reformed boybands 5ive and East 17. (A third attempt, featuring the group fka Bucks Fizz and an Elvis impersonator, is planned for June 19.)

Britain’s creative community seems to be erring on the side of staying in—Super Furry Animals’ Gruff Rhys released a love song to the Union, “I Love EU”—though one dissenting voice came from Foals’ Yannis Philippakis in an interview with BBC Radio 1. “My main concern, and I guess this is the thing the Brexit people are playing upon, is a fear that the population will expand to 80m people in Britain,” he told the Newsbeat program. “And when you already have problems with the NHS, you have problems with schooling, there are problems within British society’s infrastructure, my concern would only be that you don’t have sovereignty, you don’t have the ability to control what is happening in your own country.” Philippakis’ family are from Greece, which in 2012 launched history’s largest sovereign debt default. “They held referendums to not go along with the austerity measures, but you start to realize that what you think of as your country and your democratic say has been stripped away. And that’s not to say that I’m with the people that are Brexit, but I think there are very legitimate concerns.”

Evidently, there’s little worse than shoehorning pop stars into commenting on political events. But given the fact that the UK’s music industry outperformed the rest of the British economy by five percent last year (possibly thanks to Adele’s unprecedented Q4 sales surge), it’s a community whose collective voice should be part of the debate. A spokesperson for the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) emphasized the importance of the EU and Europe “to UK recorded music and to the music sector generally, particularly when you consider the importance of live music and touring.” Last year, British artists accounted for over 17 percent of album sales in the six largest European markets after the UK—Germany, France, Sweden, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands—where they enjoyed nearly a third of the share. The BPI explained that this is broadly in line with the US, but that physical sales—which typically producer higher royalties for artists and labels—tend to be more pronounced in Europe.

Pitchfork enlisted experts across the music industry to help break down the potential impact of a decision that will affect trade, free movement, and international support networks—i.e. every aspect of their business. It’s important to note that this is speculation based on existing precedents, but that interviewees were universally concerned about the prospect of Brexit.

Live Music

If Britain leaves the EU, we could find ourselves excluded from having free movement across much of Europe’s mainland. That could have two expensive, complex implications for touring bands: individual visas to enter each EU country, and the introduction of the carnet, a document detailing every single piece of equipment on deck, to prevent the import or export of products without paying VAT. It costs between £1000—£2000 (approximately $1400—$2900), and lasts just 12 months.