QUOTE (FretDancer69 @ Jul 13 2007, 02:14 AM)
yeah i guess i should take initiative! but its gonna be so hard trying to change whats Reggaeton, Rap and all that stuff that people nowadays like. But yea i think thats a good goal, arrange a rock Festival!! sounds awesome!
There's reggaeton and rap at Roskilde too (although I rarely go to the rap concerts, reggaeton isn't as much of a popular genre here).
QUOTE
And about the tragic event, i never heard of it, can you explain me what happened...if its ok with you of course.
Well, I'll give my full account rather than link to a news clip, because, while long, this is still important today, and the more people are aware of what ruthless behaviour at such an event can lead to, the better for all of us. But I have to warn, it's not a nice story.
Pearl Jam was scheduled to play at the Orange stage on the Friday at 10:30 in the evening. And so they did, and everything was pretty normal. Crowd security was on the spot, as always. It had rained, and the area was muddy, as it had been several times before. It was very very crowdy near the front of the stage, as it always was back then. So crowdy that you'd often find yourself over time involuntarily moving 50 feet or more towards mid-stage no matter where you started out, as long as it was in front.
But we were enjoying the concert even though the crowd rushed harder against the stage each minute. I think some people mentioned they were annoyed that the speakers in the rear of the area didn't work, and since there were no real barriers at that time, everyone was free to push their way all the way up to the stage.
Some people fell over - we helped them up, which wasn't easy with people standing so close that you pretty much had 6 or 7 people's shoulders pushing you from all sides - most of the time we were out of balance too. At that point I was just glad we were a bit away from front mid-stage, where it could only be worse.
Around an hour into the concert, Eddie Vedder stopped the music, told us that the next 5 minutes would have nothing to do with music, but it was very very important - he told people to stand back, give some room to the people up front, because people were getting hurt. People stepped back - for about half a minute.
When we felt the pressure coming on again, we decided it was time to get out - a friend of mine shouted to a crowd safety guard that they had to shut this concert down completely, right now. Heard some security announcer tell the people again, to quietly step back.
We only got about 20 feet away from where we were, when we heard screaming from right in front of the stage. Looked up towards the stage - heard Eddie Vedder, clearly in tears, say "Well, f*** you guys", then he squatted down on the stage.
I'd like to be able to say, like in a movie, that it's all blank after that, but it isn't. Could describe the next hour very clearly, but I wouldn't like to, on a forum which has young visitors, and this is quite enough: 8 men between 17 and 23 or 24 died right there, being crushed under the crowd or suffocated. One died a few days later in the hospital.
The blamefest started the day after and hasn't really ended. Some blamed the festival management, who could have stopped the concert earlier, had better crowd safety etc. But other, honest, festival leaders admitted that it might as well have happened at their festival, and that Roskilde actually
was probably one of the safest festivals in the world. Some weeks later, people (including the police
) started blaming Pearl Jam, who, in my opinion as someone who was close by, did everything they should - and much much more, everything they
could - to try and prevent this from happening.
The festival crowd safety has been much improved - to the point where I'm confident in saying it won't ever happen again (it
must never happen again). Pearl Jam are still affected by it to this day. Until this year, they haven't played any festivals. We went to their first (indoor) concert in Denmark since the festival a few weeks ago, and the band had invited the families of the ones who died - they've been in contact with them for the past 7 years. Vedder talked very emotionally about the tragedy and the people who died.
I'd say the blame for the accident, if there is any, falls almost entirely on the crowd - that would include myself. If everyone had been a bit less selfish and ruthless and thoughtful, it wouldn't have happened. Thankfully, people know that by now - not just those of us who were there. I've talked to lots of new festival goers, and since that year everyone has been much more aware of taking care of each other.
Countless times since then, I've seen people slip and immediately have 7 or 8 people standing in a circle around them keeping the rest of the crowd back to allow them to get up. Which is possible because the festival has put up fences, limiting how many can get into the front.
As you can see from the photos, it's not exactly deserted in the front, but there's an infinity of room compared to 2000 - makes things very very safe, and yet doesn't detract from the "community" of going to a concert (actually adds to it). Lots of other festivals have done the same since then.
We were hesitant to return the next year, it felt very very strange, but the atmosphere really had changed, and life does to on, however cynical that may seem. And with security and atmosphere and circumstances changed, there really is nothing more life affirming than rock festivals
- however strange it may sound right after all the stuff I wrote above.
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This post has been edited by Kaneda: Jul 13 2007, 11:35 AM