Faithless concert wasn’t so faithful.

Feb 7, 2011 by Justin McCall    1 Comment     Posted under: Events, General

The Faithless concert at Gallagher Estate in Johannesburg on Saturday night was a complete disaster according to many people who attended the concert.  I, fortunately, didn’t attend the concert so I dont have firsthand experience of what went down.

Real Concerts were the organisers in charge of the concert and after reading through all the complaints on their Facebook page, and some rantings on Twitter, it sure looks like they messed up big time!  Now this isn’t the first time an organiser has messed up, Big Concerts and Duran Duran had some fallout over contractual agreements a couple months ago.

Some of the issues people experienced at the concert…

• People were only let in at 8pm when the concert started at 7pm.
• Officials didn’t allow people in due to “fake tickets problem”.  So people who had paid for tickets through Computicket, for example, were not allowed in as they were deemed fake.
• There wasn’t any mention about GoldFish being the opening act, and they had a dismal crowd to play for as they were all still outside waiting to come in.
• No refuse bins were provided at the entrance, so those entering with water bottles had to just leave them lying on the floor.  Which also caused a major obstacle in getting into the venue.
• Gold Circle ticket holders had to climb over barriers just to get into the Gold Circle ticket holders line which wasn’t marked at all.
• A lack of security was also another concern raised by most people.
• People arrived to see the last song of GoldFish after standing in the queue for so long.
• Faithless was due to play between 8 and 10.  They only started at 9pm and played for an hour only.
• The sound was a shocker.  Lyrics couldn’t be heard, and people were battling to recognise their songs due to poor sound.
• There were no bigscreens for people at the back to see the stage.  People at the back simply couldn’t even see the stage.
• Because people were battling to see, lots of pushing and fights ensued.
• Food & beverages supplies were “a joke” and ran out before Faithless started playing.
• And the last nail in the coffin was the SINGLE EXIT path for everyone.  Surely that doesn’t meet any safety standards?

Now I realise that I wasn’t there, but I for one am sick and tired of these concert organisers taking a fat blue train ride on our hard-earned money.  We pay good money to see our favourite stars in action, and this is what you give us?  A below sub-standard concert with dangerous elements.  I just thank the good Lord that nothing bad happened, for your sake.

Got anything to say? Go ahead and leave a comment!