Is anyone going to Antiworlds 07/07/07 event?

[davethedrummer]

enrico (the promoter) isn't a bad guy. i think he just got a little bit out of his depth and after knowing the ticket sales were low, it was either pull the event or put it on and hope. i went down knowing i wasn't going to get paid but sadly was told it was off 40 mins from the venue. i think the situation is here is enrico has tried to do a serious music festival but got certain things to do with promotion wrong. fair play to him for trying but i really do feel for those that spent money on a ticket and felt they got a raw deal. i thnk iit's just one of those things. if it was me i wouldn't try to put a gig on like this without first being a little more recognised as a name out of london.

sorry mark i disagree
he is a twat
and i'm not surprised this went the way it did
he's got a bad habit of not paying and not respecting ( did anyone hear about them emptying the loos into the local river????)
and to be honest that is why i was not on the bill

i will not play for him

end of

[RDR]

sorry mark i disagree
he is a twat
and i'm not surprised this went the way it did
he's got a bad habit of not paying and not respecting ( did anyone hear about them emptying the loos into the local river????)
and to be honest that is why i was not on the bill

i will not play for him

end of

Thats a damning indictment.

[dirty_bass]

sorry mark i disagree
he is a twat
and i'm not surprised this went the way it did
he's got a bad habit of not paying and not respecting ( did anyone hear about them emptying the loos into the local river????)
and to be honest that is why i was not on the bill

i will not play for him

end of

Now there is a big old nugget of the truth.
So many naughty things have happened behind the scenes with this "organisation".
Since day dot at tyssen street studios, bad shenanigans have gone on.
It`s about time it was disclosed.

[MARK ANXIOUS]

well i can only go on my own experience. i've been paid all the time apart from alexandra palace and even then it was me who told him not to bother cause he'd obviously lost out. anyway, a forum is the wrong place to get into this surely?? :;

it's a shame, cause the uk does need more events like glade and the like. hopefully we'll get someone else taking the risk in the future, but obviously with a bit more thought about promotion...

[teknorich]

Am going to Glade, and well looking forward to it, but it could do with a bit more techno.
Mark, any chance of you driving up in a minibus and playing the decks out of the back doors, like a crazy mobile disco?!? He he, that'd be ace =)

[MARK ANXIOUS]

Am going to Glade, and well looking forward to it, but it could do with a bit more techno.
Mark, any chance of you driving up in a minibus and playing the decks out of the back doors, like a crazy mobile disco?!? He he, that'd be ace =)

do you know, i was thinking of buying a van next time instead of a car, so that i could do exactly this. i've lost count of the times i've been outside a party thinking wouldn't this be a great spot to bang out some tunes. imagine that. a full on mobile techno machine.

[Mucky Beats]

do you know, i was thinking of buying a van next time instead of a car, so that i could do exactly this. i've lost count of the times i've been outside a party thinking wouldn't this be a great spot to bang out some tunes. imagine that. a full on mobile techno machine.

hahaha....sounds good... but your always in a rush let alone a party bus...you need a fast car mark hahaha

[TechMouse]

do you know, i was thinking of buying a van next time instead of a car, so that i could do exactly this. i've lost count of the times i've been outside a party thinking wouldn't this be a great spot to bang out some tunes. imagine that. a full on mobile techno machine.

Like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AeZOeTg5dDE

(But with better music obviously...)

[Little_Fella!]

Like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AeZOeTg5dDE

(But with better music obviously...)

Yes Yes YES!!

I saw this, it was at the ExCel centre in London... I vowed to win the lottery:cheese:

Then outside there was a proper Judge Dredd style futuristic truck thing that was just one big ****off speaker pumping out hard techtrance.... WOW!

I've been on the rob ever since...:briggin:

[davethedrummer]

well i can only go on my own experience. i've been paid all the time apart from alexandra palace and even then it was me who told him not to bother cause he'd obviously lost out. anyway, a forum is the wrong place to get into this surely?? :;

it's a shame, cause the uk does need more events like glade and the like. hopefully we'll get someone else taking the risk in the future, but obviously with a bit more thought about promotion...

sorry mark maybe you're right about it being on a forum , apologies if its too harsh ( or too true )
but i have spoken my mind directly to enrico and to many others involved in antiworld
they know my views on it so i don't feel wrong in saying it here
i've got nothing to hide here
you would have got payed along with most "guest" djs most of the time as that was the way they did things at antiworld.

no the reason i am so sore is largely down to the way us "resident" djs were treated over the years

and boy do they know it.

just a little more respect would have gone such a long way

[davethedrummer]

*paid*

[Si the Sigh]

Just found this...

Antiworld would like to apologise to all festival goers, artists and crew who attended last weekend’s 070707 Festival at Rushmore Arena and thank them for their support and understanding. We are very sorry about the early closure of the festival and the problems that occurred. We’re going to try and address some of your concerns below as we are well aware that there’s more than a few rumours being spread and we would prefer that people know the truth.

The festival opened around two hours late on Thursday afternoon after passing all its health and safety checks. We were scheduled to open at 3 pm but gates finally opened at 5 pm after a later fire inspection took longer than anticipated. We apologise to the people waiting at 3 pm, but we could only wait until the council carried out their vital checks to ensure the site was safe.

On Saturday at 2.45 pm the company responsible for waste disposal pumped raw sewage into a pipe near the top of the festival site. We would like to stress that this company had been paid a substantial deposit to provide the portaloos around the site and dispose of the waste at a facility nearby, and given their many years of experience at other major UK festivals, there was absolutely no reason to doubt their ability, nor that they would take shortcuts. Unfortunately however the pipe the sewage was pumped into exploded and the sewage surfaced in the backstage area, specifically the artist and crew kitchen and catering area, which was immediately shut by the council.

On Saturday evening we managed to deal with this situation by arranging meals for artists and crew through the various stalls on the site, and with so many of the public already on site waiting for the main headliners, the decision was taken that it was too dangerous to evacuate at this time with little or no public transport and not much chance of it being safe for people to drive. We’d like to thank all that helped out here, especially the Veggedelic stall who saved the day and provided great wholesome food throughout and all the other crew who did more than their fair share. We can only apologise for the stress and extra work this caused. We appreciate that you all worked far more than had been agreed and will be in touch with you individually about your refunds. We would like crew to know that we had actually spent thousands of pounds on food and supplies to get us all through the festival, but due to regulations we could not actually cook or start fires on the site ourselves once the crew kitchen had been closed.

By Sunday it was evident that we couldn’t feed all the crew and the environmental health issues were growing. There were concerns that if it rained the sewage would get into the water table and contaminate the festival area, putting the health of festival goers, artists and crew at risk. The festival was closed around midday on Sunday after a council inspection showed that there was no way that the environmental safety issues could be resolved in the time we had left. We couldn’t feed the crew we had left and the medics had left thanks to the health and safety issues, so the police recommended we close the site or else they would be forced to take further action. However with so many party-goers still in festival mode it was impossible to evacuate the entire area in a hurry, although we couldn’t start cleaning up or doing any work until the public were off the site.

If we hadn’t shut when we did Skazi and Talamasca would have played. They were waiting and were just as disappointed as the rest of us that they didn’t get to play in the end. Whether artists play or not, they still need their flights and hotels paid and it’s a long way to come and sit in a hotel room.

Another point that should be addressed is that we placed too much expectation on our ticket sales when planning the festival. Originally our plan was to stage a 5,000 capacity camping festival, but we then found out it needed to be bigger if we wanted to use the awesome Rushmoor Arena site. The licence was granted for 15,000 campers — another mistake, because there was no possible way for Antiworld to sell that many tickets in today’s current climate, despite the great efforts of the many promoters, artists and crew involved.

By April 2007 sales were still slow and the festival should have been cancelled and tickets refunded, but we still felt we could move forward with the help of sponsorship and more advance sales. By June 2007 sales were steady but not in the numbers we had hoped and sponsors were not available due to commitments made to other festivals. By this time, we had spent a lot of money in advertising and in fees toward artists to secure the dates. Many of the artists who didn’t turn up to perform had already received 50% of their fees in advance but decided not to turn up because the remaining 50% due had not cleared into their account on time. We know this was a big disappointment for some of those who came to the festival hoping to see a favourite act; again we can only apologise.

After years of planning and preparation we are devastated by the outcome and can only apologise to the many festival goers, artists and crew who were as sorely disappointed as we are after losing out on the final seven or so hours of the festival. We’re also aware that there were some organisational problems with the festival itself and due to there being lower numbers than expected, some artists and stages were cancelled. The cancellation of the stages/artists was down to agreements between the specific artists and promotions involved: as explained above, deposits had been paid.

We’d like to thank the council for making sure the festival opened in the first place and for helping us provide a safe yet beautiful venue for people to party in. We all had the welfare of festival goers at heart and did our best to make sure things were as safe as possible at all times, especially given the extreme recent weather conditions. We’d also like to thank the police for their help closing the festival on Sunday afternoon. Closing a busy festival at its peak was always going to be a challenge and the police made sure festival goers and crew were informed and able to stay on site until they were ready to move — leading to many saying that Sunday was their best night of the festival, with so many groups of chilled out festival goers and crew making the most of their time left.

Most of all though, we’d like to thank the 5000 party-goers, artists and crew that made this such an incredible event. Yes there were a few things that went wrong, and the people involved will be contacted over the next couple of weeks to discuss their individual situations and try and make amends. Overall however the crowd, site, stages, music and production were fantastic.

We hope that festival-goers, artists and crew and anyone else who has suffered as a result of this event can bear with us over this difficult time and ask you to please understand that we are not doing this for the money: we have lost everything — the income from many successful events, years worth of planning and hard work and any goodwill we may have built up over the years from party goers, artists and last but by no means least, our crew.

Please direct your feedback to e303power@hotmail.com or text 0779 321 9497. Don’t call or leave a message but text and we’ll get back to you over the next couple of weeks. We realise that many people need refunds and compensation for the money that have lost, but this is a situation that is going to take some time to sort out. We need to hear your suggestions and concerns, especially if anyone has any video footage of the waste that ultimately led to the site being closed, as we will need as much evidence as possible for our legal proceedings.

Thanks again to all the festival-goers, artists and crew who made this one hell of a festival.

Peace and love,
Enrico Sorbello
Antiworld

[TechMouse]

it's a shame, cause the uk does need more events like glade and the like.

Really?

Surely the fact that it was so woefully undersold is a pretty big indicator that the UK probably doesn't need another event like this.

If the demand was there then there wouldn't have been so many problems.

[MARK ANXIOUS]

Really?

Surely the fact that it was so woefully undersold is a pretty big indicator that the UK probably doesn't need another event like this.

If the demand was there then there wouldn't have been so many problems.

good point. why oh why is techno so unrepresented over here. it drives me insane. i play in holland and 50,000 are dancing to miss djax and luke slater EACH weekend.

i have to say, this event had alot of potential. it just wasnt promoted right... imho...

[Technobitch]

gutted it didnt all work out, i really wanted to go and support this event, i thought it was a wicked line up for the uk but i just couldnt get ppl to go, they all presume for what ever reason that as its on in the uk there well be to many rules and regulations and wouldnt be as good as abroad.

[eyeswithoutaface]

gutted it didnt all work out, i really wanted to go and support this event, i thought it was a wicked line up for the uk but i just couldnt get ppl to go, they all presume for what ever reason that as its on in the uk there well be to many rules and regulations and wouldnt be as good as abroad.

and that's exactly how it was! :)

the uk just isnt the place for big festivals with lineups of that magnitude, with the odd exceptions like Glade and to be fair, alot of festivals in London always seem to be really, really well run, if a little dodgy and camp lineup wise

[TechMouse]

why oh why is techno so unrepresented over here. it drives me insane. i play in holland and 50,000 are dancing to miss djax and luke slater EACH weekend.

Because this country, en masse, is in a cultural sewer where the vast majority of people are happy to be told what they like.

[tOM B]

Really?

Surely the fact that it was so woefully undersold is a pretty big indicator that the UK probably doesn't need another event like this.

If the demand was there then there wouldn't have been so many problems.

i disagree with this, we work at 6 or 7 festivals every year and 90% of these are sold out - those that aren't are seeing increasing ticket sales every year

I think timing is critical - it is very close to the glade and not long after glastonbury (alot of folks will still be on site there).

The other major factor is don't run before you can walk - 15 000 people is a lot for your first festival. Ok so they couldn't have used that venue but i'm sure there are others. If you start smaller and gain a reputation for being a well organised event then you can grow. The glade was in it's third year last year and only just hit 15 000, it's an extremly well organised event and is always oversubscribed. Also they'd done their stage at glastonbury first - thus meaning they already had their foot in the door with the festival community - unfortunatly antiworld hasn't really been seen as part of the 'festival circuit' and will therefore not attract a certain amount of people who travel event to event.

I think the uk has got the market for events of this kind - the bloc weekender was a huge success - but they do need to be organised and thought out properly.

[teknorich]

But are those general "dance" music festivals, like Creamfileds, Global gathering etc?
This festival had quite a heavy tilt towards techno, much more so than other festivals such as Glade. Could that be why it was so undersold??

[tOM B]

all different - but they all still work. The thing about a festival is that is it about much more than just the music. Hell the big green gathering and shambala don't even release line ups and they still do really well. I don't think it's about what music you decide to put on it's about getting the scale right and creating a 'whole event'