The night of November 5th is remembered as pure horror due to the heart-rending events that transpired at the Travis Scott Astroworld Music Festival in Houston, Texas. The 2021 festival resulted in 10 deaths, caused by compression asphyxia from the swelling crowd of attendees that had no breathing room or room to move their arms.
Rolling Loud is the world’s largest hip-hop festival. Some of the biggest names in the hip-hop and R&B music industry have been presented by Rolling Loud. Young Thug, Lil Baby, Latto, and J. Cole are a few well known artists to name.
Rolling Loud, promoted by Live Nation, the same company that promoted Scott’s Astroworld Festival was one of the first to implement safety measures for their December Festival in California.
“We welcome everyone to experience our festivals, however in light of recent events, we will be implementing an 18+ policy specific only to our upcoming 2021 California festival,” Rolling Loud announced on Twitter.
Twitter users voiced their opinions as to the festival’s late release of their new regulations: “I appreciate that they’re trying to make their event safer but the majority of the AstroFest victims were 18+.” Meanwhile, other users expressed their enthusiasm: “Thank You. Music Festivals are not a place for kids.”
This age restriction can be a good first step for Rolling Loud and other music festivals. However, age is not the only factor that needs to be taken into account considering the lack of ill-trained security guards who were not prepared for an excitable crowd of this magnitude.
According to an interview done with TMZ, a security guard expressed his safety concerns due to the job instructions being “brief” and “vague.” He also touched up on the morning of the Astroworld Festival being very short staffed for security.
Concerts are meant to be thrilling experiences for fans and under no circumstances should they be in fear for their life because it turned into a death event. Travis Scott’s Astroworld Festival was an unfortunate tragedy that possibly could have been prevented with the right security measures. Moving forward, there needs to be a change to protect festival fans and security guards, to ensure nothing like this can ever happen again. Small steps were made in the right direction with the new age mandate for their December 2021 event. Unfortunately, it appeared to be a temporary requirement as evidence shows by all ages being welcomed for their Rolling Loud Miami 2022 event. Hopefully, it initiates real change to happen moving forward for all musical concerts of this magnitude.