THE PRODIGY MANAGER PRESS RELEASE RE POLISH

THE PRODIGY MANAGER PRESS RELEASE RE POLISH

 PRESS RELEASE
THE PRODIGY PERFORMANCE AT WOODSTOCK FESTIVAL, POLAND, 06/08/11
The promoter of the Woodstock Festival in Poland – Mr Owsiak – has made false accusations
against The Prodigy, their production crew and ourselves as representatives, regarding
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‘unsafe’ and ‘unprofessional’ practices following their performance on Saturday night 6
August 2011.
These accusations are categorically denied.
It was brought to our attention by our production manager Karel Hamm on Friday night that
Mr Owsiak had no intention of providing a safety barrier in front of the stage, despite signing a
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legally binding contract agreeing to installing barriers on April 4 2011. As the biggest open
air European festival with a 500,000 capacity - the provision of safety barriers is
acknowledged as an essential practice at all festivals in Europe and indeed the world, and
NOT a demand from the band to protect themselves. We want to protect Polish lives. The
safety barrier was insisted on by the bands’ manager John Fairs to protect the crowd; to allow
access of security and medical staff to the fans, who were pulling people out and over the
barrier when they had exhaustion etc, also to allow water to be given to the audience,
including the fireman’s hose that was cooling the crowd - none of this would have been
possible with the crowd directly in front of the stage without a safety barrier to protect them.
Without this Mr Owsiak – and his event – would have been putting the crowd at huge risk,
especially given the subsequent promoters report of 670,000 people in attendance. In reality,
an event of this size should and must have several barrier lines. Woodstock is clearly in
breach of the No 1 goal of The European Festival Association – YOUROPE – of which they
are a member. Yourope exists to:
“educate and inform its members with seminars, workshops and panels. Yourope tries to
raise the standards in Health & Safety in the festival business”
The festival may have been organised in line with Polish law however it was certainly not run
in line with European regulations. Even in Poland it is common practise for Events organisers
to adhere to the HSE Events Safety Guide which stipulates that safety barriers must be
placed in front of the stage at all times not just during a performance by The Prodigy. AlterArt
whom organise Open’er, Coke Festival and Selector Festival refer to the HSE Events Safety
Guide, Go Ahead who organise Jarocin Festival refer to this guide as do Good Music and
Charm Music. It is common practice in Poland due to outdated Polish legislation. It is
important to ensure the safety of our audience taking into account all potential eventualities.
Barriers are in place to protect the safety of the audience, not the band.
To our great relief we have been informed that there have been no serious injuries, but given
Mr Owsiak’s response to the safety barrier we can only say that this is the most unsafe
festival I have worked at in 25 years and would urge all promoters and artists to consider very
seriously the inevitable consequences of severe if not fatal incidents at an event which has no
regard for the audiences’ health and safety in front of the stage.
Further allegations have been made to the detriment of the band’s character that are utterly
false. The reason they travelled to and from the site with a police escort is to avoid chronic
road congestion. There are always traffic queues in and out of festival sites - it was quoted by
that 124,000 vehicles attended the event. All headline artists use police escorts to get through
traffic when severe delays are possible. It is necessary and not arrogant. Furthermore, it is
advisable for the band to leave immediately after their performance to avoid the congestion
leaving the site. This is a fact and NOT as the promoter said due to concern that the safety
barriers had caused injuries amongst the crowd, as we believe has been insinuated in the
media.
We all have nothing but respect for the great work Mr Owsiak and the charity does, which is
why the band came out to support him and the Polish people, but the crowd safety situation
does need to be thoroughly re-addressed ahead of any future events.
John Fairs (Manager to The Prodigy) E: [email protected]
Tony Duckworth (Polish Label Manager Mystic Prod) E: [email protected]
CPA (Concert Promoters Association):
New HSE legislation which came into effect in April 2001 made health and safety issues a
major priority. The introduction of the corporate manslaughter legislation will mean that all
promoters must constantly reassess possible safety risks at their events. Crowd management
has also been a priority issue in the wake of Roskilde.
HSE Event Safety Guide
If audience pressure is expected a front-of-stage barrier will be necessary. Factors to be
taken into account include audience density, the likely behaviour and size of the audience
and the nature of the venue. For most concerts, some form of front-of-stage barrier will be
required.
Joint promoter statement from Good Music, AlterArt, Charm and Go Ahead:
The HSE Event Safety Guide is widely used by Polish Event companies and promoters
including AlterArt, Go Ahead, Good Music and Charm Music. AlterArt are the most
experienced Festival promoter in Poland and they use the HSE Event Safety Guide as they
believe that these regulations offer the best safety for attendees of such events whether they
be spectators, media or artists. All the above companies believe it is best practice to use the
HSE Event Safety Guide in the absence of adequate Polish regulations.
Lukasz Minta – Go Ahead Artistic Agency (Poland)
In my opinion the lack of protective barriers on such a big festival as Przystanek Woodstock,
where thousands of people have fun, can be a cause of tragedy. Fortunately so far no such
tragedy has occurred but the situation which happened at Roskilde Festival in 2000 during
the Pearl Jam performance or last year at the German Love Parade show that the smallest
oversight can create negative effects. We organise Jarocin Festival, where every year a much
smaller number of participants attend than at Woodstock, I can’t imagine running Jarocin
without protective barriers. No professional security company would not have taken steps to
protect an audience at such an event, barriers are necessary as a basic safety principle.
Another issue is the fact that Woodstock’s organiser had to accept The Prodigy rider
conditions, where without doubt there is a paragraph relating to safety barriers. I am surprised
that the issue arose on the day of The Prodigy performance.
Festival Republic Ltd (Melvin Benn, MD – Glastonbury / Reading and Leeds Festival ):
The decision John Fairs made was, in my opinion, wholly appropriate and correct.
We work hard on public safety at festivals in the UK and very much apply tested science to
ensure that barriers are used in high pressure situations as is always the case when The
Prodigy play and the science suggests that the most appropriate height for the body to
withstand the pushing pressure is 1.2m high and that the barrier should be able to withstand
4.6 Kilo Newton pressure at that height to ensure maximum safety for the fans.
While the lack of barrier works for many people and many shows - as it obviously did in
Poland at times - it is your artist and their fans that you have to protect and I think that by
insisting on a barrier for your show will certainly have resulted in less injuries than had there
not been a barrier and for that you should be applauded.
T in The Park, Scotland – Festival Boss Geoff Ellis
At T in the Park, we use appropriate barriers at every stage for audience safety. On the
primary stages, where audiences can reach 60,000, they are absolutely essential and we
would not consider operating without one. Also, it is very unlikely that the event would be
granted a license from the local council if we did not use stage barriers.
For our Main Stage we felt the need to add a secondary barrier several years ago to increase
audience safety.
Stage Barriers also enable stewards and medics to access the crowd easier if anyone is
experiencing difficulties.
We risk assess all acts on all stages and due to the lively, intense nature of a Prodigy
audience we would always increase stewarding in the pit between stage and barrier to
maximum levels.
Live Nation, UK (Toby Leighton-Pope):
In the UK we at Live Nation take health and safety very seriously, we would never put on an
event of this size without a safety barrier. Its sounds extremely dangerous