Security not a factor in Hard L.A. cancellation, promoter says

In deciding to merge the July event with an August concert instead, Hard Events’ Gary Richards cites extra rules and costs created in the wake of a death after the Electric Daisy Carnival.

In the wake of controversy after the death of a 15-year-old girl at a rave held at the Los Angeles Coliseum on June 25, the annual Hard L.A. concert, scheduled to take place Saturday at downtown’s Los Angeles State Historic Park, was abruptly canceled Monday.

The concert was to feature beat-based acts including M.I.A., Die Antwoord, Flying Lotus, Sleigh Bells and others and was drawing extra scrutiny because of its location at the park, just east of Chinatown.

The cancellation arrived a week after the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors appointed a task force to “enhance rave safety” after Sasha Rodriguez died of a suspected drug overdose after attending the Electric Daisy Carnival. Establishment of the task force came after the Coliseum Commission announced a temporary ban on new contracts with rave operators as they review such events. 

Gary Richards, the promoter of Hard L.A., denied the cancellation was caused by the Coliseum incident but acknowledged that in the wake of Rodriguez’s death, city officials forced the producers to add “a lot of extra stipulations and requirements” that “resulted in unforeseen costs to the event.” He said his company, Hard Events, plans to go ahead with an Aug. 7 concert at the park and that some acts scheduled to appear Saturday would be shifted to the later event.

“I don't want anyone to think that this cancellation had anything to do with the events that occurred at Electric Daisy Carnival, because it didn't,” Richards said.

“We’ve been working with the city for months, and all our security plans were approved,” Richards said. “We just thought it would be better to put both events together. This didn’t have anything to do with security issues.”

Richards has long sought to distance himself from the notion that his events are raves, which are often associated with consumption of the drug Ecstasy. The Hard concerts feature live performances, while most raves are driven by DJs playing electronic dance music.

Official statements from Biz3, the event’s publicity team, cited “events beyond our control” as a reason for the cancellation but “not due to the lack of support or the full approval from the personnel at the city of Los Angeles and California State Parks who have signed off on our comprehensive security plan.”

Joel Bellman, a spokesman for Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky’s office, said he was unaware that Hard L.A. had been canceled.

“Zev has never said anything about rave-type events at any other venue other than the Coliseum,” Bellman said. Calls were deferred to the mayor’s office, which did not respond to requests for comment.

Fresh Squeezed, another L.A. electronic music festival planned for the city of Industry, was canceled on July 10 after difficulties securing a location and permits in light of the new public scrutiny. The summer’s other big electronica event, the Love Festival, is scheduled to take place at the Los Angeles Sports Arena, next to the Coliseum, on Aug. 21.

It was unclear how the call for a moratorium might affect that event, although a formal decision could be made as early as Friday, when the Coliseum Commission is slated to discuss the Love Festival’s fate.

Richards declined to comment on whether slow ticket sales influenced the cancellation. A number of major music acts have canceled scheduled dates this summer because of poor ticket sales. Last week, concert tracking website Pollstar announced that the summer concert season is down 17% from this time last year.

-- August Brown & Todd Martens

Note: Portions of this story appeared on Pop & Hiss yesterday. The version presented here is what was printed in Calendar for Tuesday, July 13.

Photo: M.I.A. at Coachella in 2009. Credit: Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times

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Comments

[The Iron]

Hard L.A. is not a rave. Why raves are mentioned in this article is a good question for this writer.

[gab]

Are we really going to argue what constitutes as a rave? like all city officials need to go forward with that notion is young people and drugs listening to loud electronic music and that's really all it takes. But that's not even the issue at stake here. It's really about how people didn't want to pay 50 bucks per day to see M.I.A. flop around to a sampled Suicide song.

[EVAN GUNNY]

HARD IS MOST DEFENIT A RAVE ... I RAN THE HARD PROMOTIONS FOR GARY RICHARDS TILL MY RESIGNATION DUE TO MR RICHARDS SERVING MINORES ALCOHOL.. HARD IS A DEFENTION OF A RAVE.. JUST BECAUSE THE ACTS ARE LIVE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT BEING A RAVE OR NOT... THE DEFINITION OF RAVE IS THE DANCE MUSIC FACTOR.... THE ROOTS HAVE PERFORMED AT A RAVE..... WU TANG HAS PERFORMED AT A RAVE..... SO TO SIT HERE AND SAY HARD IS NOT A RAVE IS STUPID... HARD HAS 13 YEAR OLD ON XTC.. DRUG DEALERS EVERYWHERE.. I KNOW I HAD CAUGHT AND KICKED OUT DOZENS AT HARD HALLOWEEN 08 HARD 13 2009 DRUGS ARE ESSENTIAL TO HARD'S PATRONS...... MY RICHARDS IS A FRAUD AND A JOKE TO THIS INDUSTRY.. HE PROMOTES EVENTS AFTER THEY SELL OUT.. AND I HAVE PROOF OF THIS... HARD IS THE EPITOME OF EVIL IN THE RAVE SCENE AND NEEDS TO BANISHED FOR GOOD.........

JOIN THE BOYCOTT HARD PAGE ON FACEBOOK FOR THE UP AND COMING NEWS AND GOSSIP ON THE DOWNFALL OF HARD AND ITS SUPPORT OF DRUG USE AT RAVES....

[Galaxy420*]

Anyways, Hard summer fest last year FAILED hard because HARD oversold the event. By the time we got inside the music was already off because of people hurling themselves over the balcolny to get to the floor. The firefighters had closed capacity and because of that people started to jump. Anyways, I still got a refund, so although it was a horribly planned event/night at least I still got my money back. I know HARD tries to say that it isn't a 'rave' , and neither does ANY concert promoter. But can you really call HARD LA a rave event? Although I know the crowd is full of Ravers, most of the lineup for this event was more hip-hop roots, with some Dubstep and electro.

I just think it is really broad of everyone calling every single electro themed concert a "rave". Really they are music festivals and we should leave it at that. Just because the crowd is geared towards a particular subculture doesn't mean that all music is considered specifically that too.

[nicole]

If anyone was upset about missing Theophilus London because HARD got cancelled, he's hosting and performing at the Purple Lounge this Friday night (7/16/10) in Hollywood. It's free with RSVP at www.dubfrequency.com.

10pm-2am | 21+

[NevarNollevres]

I paid the $60 ($120 for 2 tickets actually, with a total $10 service charge...$130) mainly to see Die Antwoord. I found out today thru the weekly that the HARD LA show this Saturday was cancelled. I then found out that the El Rey show featuring them was sold out, all this being in the "Go" pick no less...

I paid for the tickets at a local store in Echo Park with a $5 dollar added service fee for each ticket. My refund will only be for the $60 "face value" as they say, so i'm out $10 plus the hassle of having to manually email my info for the refund and wait for it by mail (i called the store and they were told to refer me to the website...boyfriend says "Why don't they refund it for us?" Who knows....).
I had been looking forward to this show for almost 2 months now (experiencing the rare Die Antwoord live performance). Would have been nice to at least get a "first dibs" at El Rey.

I feel like getting Pretty Pissed tattooed on my neck.

[mee!!]

"It's kind of disturbing how quick you guys were to turn on eachother its like ravers have split up into 2 seperate groups

the side that wants everything 18+
and the side that thinks it should be all ages/16+

its pretty funny how alot of people calling for 18+ started raving before they were 18 i think thats a little hypocritical just saying

i just think we shouldnt let the powers that be (i guess you'd say) turn us against eachother we are all in this together and regardless of age we all make mistakes, i just think it's wrong to sever a whole group from our community when they love and care about edm just as much as we adults do!

instead of having the 18+ age limit i say we have a decency policy or something so that ATLEAST underage girls (if not adults too) cant go to raves looking like whores (if that makes sense)
-Showtime"

THIS WAS NOT WRITTEN BY ME!I DONT CLAIM THIS,IM SIMPLY POSTING THIS BECAUSE ITS TRUE!ALL OF THIS GOES TO THE RIGHTFUL OWNER!!!!
SOURCE:http://www.plurlife.com/view_journal.php?n=90&journal_id=1526338