The Astroworld Tragedy’s How live music, artist engagement with audiences, and criticism of musicians has changed in the aftermath of Travis Scott’s Astroworld Festival. Written by Sarah Bores Designed by Anvitha Nekkanti Graphics by Tamar Ponte
Ten lives lost. Hundreds injured. Thousands stomped on, crushed, and unable to breathe. In the year since the mass casualty event that was Travis Scott’s Astroworld Festival, the concert experience has drastically changed. The festival of over 50,000 eager fans quickly got out of control as at least 200 people surged through checkpoints to enter the festival without tickets. Thousands rushed the stage, unconscious bodies fell to the ground, and the concert still continued. For 37 minutes, Travis Scott continued to play after Houston authorities declared it a mass casualty event and even completed his entire set. The staff working the festival were unable to control the crowd, lacked adequate medical personnel and security, and had no passageway for ambulances to get through the seas of people. The crowd got so rowdy that people even climbed on top of medical vehicles and were lifting unconscious bodies up to be crowd-surfed away. This “raging” of fans, also seen in the music industry in forms of moshing and stage diving, has long been encouraged by Scott. The rapper has been arrested and accused of inciting riots at his concerts on two other occasions. At Lollapalooza festival in Chicago, Scott’s set was cut off five minutes in after he encouraged the crowd to rush the barricades, flip off the security team and chant, “We want rage.” This situation resulted in a stampede and numerous injuries. In 2017, Scott was once again arrested for inciting a riot at a performance in Arkansas when he told fans to rush the stage and bypass the security. Following the incident, he pleaded guilty to
75