CAFE and restaurant patrons could soon be eating in silence, after a proposal by Australia's largest record labels to increase the cost of background music by up to 2000 times.

The push to raise the cost of playing recorded music could also make gym membership more expensive unless fitness classes use artists excluded by Australian copyright laws, including Elvis Presley and Beethoven.

The bid by the Phonographic Performance Company of Australia, which represents more than 750 record companies, follows a decision by the Copyright Tribunal to approve an increase of 15 times the music costs for the nightclub industry, which was recently endorsed by the Federal Court of Australia.

The Australasian Performing Right Association, which collects licensing fees on behalf of composers and artists, has launched a separate action for a tenfold increase in the fees paid by nightclubs for recorded music.

Buoyed by the nightclub ruling, the PPCA is now targeting eateries. It wants to increase licensing fees in a 120-seat restaurant to $19,344 a year  up from $125. Small cafes would be slugged with a 4729 per cent yearly increase from $124 to $5860.