i'm still going over in my head what prompted violence during the tiltwheel show sunday night. if anyone saw anything fucked on the side of our friends or staff please send me info. i'd like to clear this up before posting anything to organizers of the venue.

thanks for your help.

i was at the front of the stage during their entire set. at a couple points people came up to sing along into the microphone, one guy was brought offstage by jason rockhill and another was prevented from going on stage by jason rockhill. then a (most likely) intoxicated dave decker went on stage to sing along and dragged off (side) stage by rockhill, only to return later near the front. decker's friends realized that rockhill wasn't cool with this and tried to prevent him from going on stage again. eventually, decker managed to get up to the microphone and sing again, one of his own friends tried to get him off stage but resulted in bringing the microphone stand with him. then rockhill picked him up and jumped off stage with him. whatever happened offstage after this, i couldn't see as i was up at the front. i know J wang jumped off the stage. davey sang a hippy song. j wang told him to stop and that they weren't playing anymore of their set. they probably had about 3-4 songs left. there were some brief chants of 'fuck common grounds', then everyone was herded outside onto the porch. after about half an hour it was closing time and then i headed back to my friends hotel room.

Oh no, not more Fest weekend violence

disappointing.

I have a video of that last song, Texas 10. You can see the guy grab the mic, but once he goes off stage, it's tough to see what goes on. I'll post a link to it later, once I can get the damn upload to work.

Yeah, this disappointed me too. Really wanted to hear them play Skyway. Thought they were great though.

Common Grounds was a real bummer all weekend. I don't condone violence, but I could see how it would've happened there. Most of the people I've encountered who work there aren't very nice in my experience. And this goes back a few years at least.

Please tell me that Decker didn't get fucked up. I'm so not happy about all this. He already got stabbed years back at a show trying to protect a good friend at the same show that was stabbed to death.

was that the masquerade show?

i saw him afterwards and it just seemed like there was just a lot of confusion on what just happened and why.

you wanna know what the fuck happened?

i'll tell you. i fuckin' showed up. the minute i walked in the door motherfuckers were ready to battle. i bust out my golden sword and start slicing any motherfucker comin my way. security couldn't stop me, the band couldn't stop me, the crowd couldnt stop me.

the bartenders tried to stop me, but all they did was get cut the fuck up.

i was on a fucking mission.

a mission to kill.

finally after all the carnage, the bloodshed, the gore, i left. went back to my apartment with my buddy and had a few cold ones before going to bed relatively early at about 1:30.

yeah I was there, this is pretty much exactly what happened. it's a shame it went down like this but I mean they got in his way

This is probably the most baseless thing I have ever heard. Some of the employees might have been a bit on edge given the amount of people and level of drunkenness but that is to be expected. If you had to work 14 hour shifts for three straight days dealing with a bunch of drunks that don't understand how to behave civilly you might be a bit irritated too.

As far as the Decker situation goes, I know Dave. He is a great guy but when he gets drunk he can be a bit overwhelming. Sometimes his desire to have fun impedes other people's. This is my understanding of what happened. Jason was doing his job protecting the crowd and the equipment. Why can't folks just enjoy watching a band? Why do they feel that they are so important that they need to become part of the show? It blows my mind.

Jon

I didn't want to open a new thread for my bad experience with Common Grounds employees, so I'll post it right here (since it happened on the same day in the same venue as this Tiltwheel thing).

The story goes like this: I was standing two or three meters from a kid and a girl who got into a fight (or at least starting it), so it was naturally for me to try to stop this fight. This girl was pretty violent, she almost tear my shirt. So the only chance I got was to move to the entrance door (the last thing I wanted was to fight with a girl!!).

Later, when talking with one of CG employees at the door, I discovered she's working in the club. She was a blond girl. The person at the door (I don't know his name, because he didn't want to shake my hand when I wanted to introduce myself) said that I was in a group of four people attacking her - which I find totally absurd and ridiculous, since all I wanted was to stop people fighting at the show. In my opinion, there should be no violence at punk rock shows. I must add that I was completely sober.

The guy at the door said that I shouldn't interfered into a fight, because that's a job for security personnel (he said that this is CG's policy, but I couldn't know that since this wasn't written anywhere). But again, it's such a ridiculous argument, since there was no way I could know that this blond girl was working there - she wasn't wearing an armband or any other sign that would show she's an employee of the club. I thought she was an attendee of the festival, who was there for the same reasons I was - to enjoy great music and festival's atmosphere.

I wanted to convince a guy at the door that they got it completely wrong, and that all I was trying to do was to stop a fight, and that they'll "kick the wrong guy out", but he said that there's no way I'm ever entering a club again. My arguments just didn't have any value, and the fact that I have traveled so far, and spend so much money to get to the US, was dismissed as irrelevant. I'm not saying that this guy at the door was rude, but all I was asking for was some understanding and another chance to get back to the club. But all I got from him were plain bureaucratic answers.

So I missed This Bike Is A Pipebomb and The Arrivals, two great bands that were on my a-must see list (I probably won't ever get a chance to see any of these two bands in Europe). Anyway, I excuse myself for this long post, but the allegations against me were so ridiculous and bad argumented. I'm a positive and non-violent person, that came to The Fest to have fun, meet new friends, and see great bands. I didn't want all this to happen.

This was my only bad experience at The Fest, and my only bad experience on my whole one-month trip in US.

I must also add that I've sent a letter of complaint to the CG folks via their website, but still haven't got any answers.

I wondered what this was all about, I was standing right next to the fight and all I saw was the blond girl taking a swing at this guy, then I saw you (big beard and hat?) stepping in then going outside with them. I later saw you talking to the guy at the back entrance to CG obviously peeved about not being able to come back in. Sorry it ended up that way for you!

How is it baseless to have an opinion on a group of people based on how they conduct themselves? Rockhill's always been a cool guy I'll give him that. But that one dude that plays drums in Averikou has always been not cool whenever I go there. And I'm not talking some casual Fest going either, but other non Fest times as well. The dude puts the hassel in Hasselhoff.