Riot On The Radio: Gigs that ended up in a massive punch-up Part 1

Craig Stephen returns to the everythingsgonegreen lounge, with a three-part offering on riotous gigs that didn’t end well … here’s part 1:

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Today the tabloid media would go apeshit if a riot broke out at an Arctic Monkeys or Green Day gig, but these days fans tend to be generally well behaved, ‘assisted’ in that endeavour by bonehead security and/or heavy-handed police surveillance. You can even take your mum along. But trouble and music once went hand in hand, and we’re talking way before Altamont.

“I’ve never been in a riot / Never been in a fight / Never been in anything / That turns out right.” – 'Never Been in a Riot' by The Mekons (1978).

So, in no particular order here’s the first half dozen gigs … (with a dozen more to come over the next two parts).

Altamont, California, 1969

The Altamont Speedway Free Festival riot was described by Rolling Stone magazine as "perhaps rock 'n' roll's all-time worst day". This was supposed to be California’s version of Woodstock, which had taken place four months earlier, but it was beset by violence from the get-go and ended with the stabbing to death of 18-year-old Meredith Hunter by a Hells Angel during the Rolling Stones' set. 

There were two other deaths at the event as well - one by drowning, another as a consequence of a hit-and-run car accident. Hunter was brandishing a revolver at the time of the incident, resulting in the Hells Angel being acquitted of murder on grounds of self-defence. 

But the circumstances leading up to the stabbing and the aftermath of Altamont continue to be discussed today. 

The festival and the Charles Manson cult killings are said to have signified the end of the 1960s hippy dream of peace and love.

Glastonbury Festival, Somerset, 1990

This particular year the ostensibly hippy festival was overshadowed by violent clashes between security forces and New Age travellers, with 235 people arrested. 

According to organiser Michael Eavis, the riot was sparked by heavy-handed treatment of the travellers by security, but also, as he told the Guardian in 2010, "We were like a social safety valve, people needed to let off steam during the Thatcher years; it just got a bit out of hand." 

Melvin Benn, who was then in charge of beer sales at the festival, said some travellers were very demanding leading up to the incident."I was dealing with a situation just off site where, at that time, there was a very rampant traveller community that were pretty un-hippy. They were pretty aggressive and the travellers were threatening to kill me. We weren't willing to give in to all of their demands. We weren't willing to allow them all in to sell drugs or give them diesel for their vehicles."

That resulted in a stand-off that resulted in a whole number of travellers making quite a vicious attack on the farmhouse, where Michael Eavis lives, just after the festival finished. 

Eavis’ daughter Emily, now a festival co-organiser, described seeing “outside the kitchen window Molotov cocktails being thrown and vehicles being set alight." 

The violence resulted in the festival being cancelled in 1991, but it returned in 1992 with a 10-foot fence around the site to ensure people paid to get in: in other words not the travellers. 

Premiere of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, Paris, 1913

It's perhaps the most infamous premiere of a ballet when Igor Stravinsky unleashed his dissonant, aggressive masterpiece at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in the French capital on 29 May 1913, and triggered a riot. Or so the legend goes. 

Witnesses told of differing accounts - of when trouble started; of how many police were called in; and of how many arrests were made (possibly as many as 40). 

Lydia Sokolova, one of the dancers on the stage that night, said the audience came prepared. "They had got themselves all ready. They didn't even let the music be played for the overture. As soon as it was known that the conductor was there, the uproar began," she said in 1965. 

The performance continued to the end, despite the rowdiness of the audience, and one thing most accounts seem to agree on is that there was an ovation.

The Jesus and Mary Chain, London, 1985

Their short, abrasive sets, often performed with their backs to the crowd, irked fans intentionally and not just on this evening. Trouble had flared up at earlier Mary Chain gigs in 1985, resulting in a tipping point at the North London Polytechnic when the PA was ripped down and punch-ups broke out amongst the crowd. 

According to Creation records boss Alan McGee: “Meat Whiplash went on first. Halfway through the set, Stevie, the guitar player, threw a wine bottle into the audience. Somebody got on stage to belt him, but he and the rest of the band ran away, except for Eddie Connolly, the bass player. So he got socked. The next band on was the Jasmine Minks, and they went on carrying clawhammers. They wanted people to see they were tooled up. So the audience had a bottle thrown at them, the second band went on with hammers ... is it any wonder it all went off?” 

NME writer Neil Spencer wrote that soon after the Mary Chain began their set a fight broke out. “They went off stage, came back on stage, the equipment got pushed off, and the police were completely incompetent. It was impossible for them to deal with it.” 

That wasn’t the end of it as the band’s Jim Reid explained. “After we came off, we were in our dressing room, and we heard all this pounding on a door down the corridor. It was an angry mob banging on a cupboard door, thinking it was our dressing room. I remember peeking out of the door, watching these people shouting, ‘Get the bastards! Get the bastards!’.”

Daniel Auber, Brussels, 1830

As violent as all the other events were, none of them caused an actual revolution. However, the performance of Daniel Auber's five-act opera La Muette de Portici in Brussels played a significant role in the Belgium revolution of the same year, which resulted in the country gaining independence from the Netherlands. 

The nationalistic opera was chosen for a performance at the Theatre de la Monnaie on 25 August 1830, as part of King William I's festival to celebrate 15 years of his reign. The French Revolution had occurred just a month earlier. 

During a second act duet, the crowd cheered so wildly that the performers had to stop singing and start over. 

Eventually, the performers reached the peak of the piece's lyrics — singing ‘Aux Armes’ (Call to Arms) — and dozens of spectators took that message literally, into the streets. When the fifth act arrived, audience members began to boo in an attempt to stop the show and apparently incite a riot. "The delirious crowd [hurled itself] out of the hall—and into history," wrote 20th-century French composer Lionel Renieu. 

The audience chanted patriotic slogans, stormed into government buildings, and began destroying factory machinery. Soon they were flying the flag of Independent Belgium.

Section 25 & Joy Division, Bury, 1980

"There were riots all the time at gigs," recalls Peter Hook.

Bury Town Hall was among the worst.

"There was a massive riot there and I got beaten up. I got beaten up all over the place," he says.

The 400-capacity hall was heaving with people after the fire exit doors were opened, letting in about 200 more in.

There were rumours that Ian Curtis had been in hospital and the gig might be cancelled. Curtis indeed wasn’t well enough to perform, but he did, briefly.

For Section 25’s finale they were joined by the three members of Joy Division, sans Ian. 

Nobody had explained any of this to the audience so there was some confusion when Curtis eventually stepped out on stage. Someone threw a pint glass at the stage sparking a fracas. Rob Gretton dived off the mixing desk into a bunch of skinheads and Hook was physically restrained in the dressing room by Tony Wilson, his wife, and Paul from Section 25.