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Concert promoter ‘takes full responsibility’ for problems at GNR gig

SINGAPORE — Some 50,000 people attended the Guns N’ Roses show for their Not In This Lifetime tour on Saturday night. While most came away satisfied just from seeing the legendary band members Axl Rose, Slash

SINGAPORE — Some 50,000 people attended the Guns N’ Roses show for their Not In This Lifetime tour on Saturday night. While most came away satisfied just from seeing the legendary band members Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan in action, many said the gig was marred by bad organisation.

Complaints have poured in about long queues for drinks and food at understocked booths, as well as issues getting in and out of the gig venue — the Changi Exhibition Centre on Aviation Park Road — via shuttle bus.

“I take full responsibility,” said Ross Knudson, 53, who runs LAMC Productions with his wife, Lauretta Alabons.

“As a promoter, I am in charge of everyone’s experience and the last thing I want is for expectations not to be met,” Knudson said.

He said that there are “many moving parts to a show” and that the biggest challenges of all in this gig were with logistics at the venue, and staffing issues.

“The show got away from us,” he admitted.

He addressed problems with the Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) wristbands, which concertgoers had to use to buy drinks and food. Concert-goers had to exchange their tickets for wristbands at the door for credits to be used to buy food and drink, then top them up using cash or credit cards.

Some left the venue with as much as S$300 in unused credits.

LAMC, which worked with Sandpiper Digital Payments Asia on the system, has since promised to rectify the situation.

LAMC posted on its Facebook page late on Saturday night that it is “working hard with our teams to formulate a refund process”.

It will publish repayment measures “in due course”.

I believe that’s fair,” said Knudson. “We were trying to push the envelope with this system, and in hindsight, we should have issued wristbands earlier to concert-goers.”

The hold-up at the door with the wristbands led to slow-moving queues to get into the venue, he said. Later, the promoter decided to “open the floodgates” which led to some tickets being checked, but not torn, said Knudson, also addressing the fact that some concert attendees were mystified as to why their tickets had not been checked.

Knudson addressed the long lines for drinks and food, with some bars running out of beer. Concert-goers also faced hour-long queues for food.

Jacqueline Sassoon, 39, told TODAY that, at one point, she had given up queueing for drinks as the bars had run out. She was in Pen A, and had little access to food, since there was only one food stall in that area. She had no access to other areas.

“We could have done it better,” Knudson said, adding that in the future for big gigs especially at the Changi Exhibition Centre, he will consult with specialists who work with festivals rather than smaller shows.

Sound-system issues also plagued the show.

Rick Allen had flown in from Hong Kong to catch the band, and bought tickets that gave him access to the VIP area right in front of the stage.

But he wrote in a comment on LAMC’s Facebook page that the sound was appalling, criticising the “very strong bass and drums but lead guitars, keyboards and Axl (were) barely audible”.

LAMC said it would pass on the feedback to the sound engineers and that sound can be subjective, differing from person to person. But with each show, engineers are usually brought in with the act who understand and work with the band’s requirements.

Many fans were also shocked at the situation with the shuttle buses — which, for some, was the only way to get in and out of the Changi Exhibition Centre. Although LAMC had warned attendees to plan their travel carefully, and not to “get stranded without transportation after an awesome night out”, there were massive lines for the buses, and with reportedly only two counters handling ticket sales.

Tickets had cost S$15 for a round-trip ride from Changi Exhibition Centre to the City Hall area.

Concert-goer Andre Poh said he was “stuck for close to an hour waiting for buses” and posted pictures of long lines on Facebook. Knudson says that there were some 120 shuttle buses available.

Others, like Adrian Cundy, drove to try to avoid the mess, but such was the crowd that he ended up stuck in the car park for two hours, not managing to get home until after 2am on Sunday — well after the show ended around 11.30pm on Saturday.

“We worked with authorities on having ample taxis around, and to have dump trucks stop running along Aviation Park Road,”said Knudson.

“Unfortunately, those two things didn’t happen on the night.”

Gig attendee Melinda Wong said in a Facebook post that “if you guys can’t handle or organise an event as huge as this, don’t do it (at all).”

To this, Knudson says that he intends to take all constructive feedback and do his best to improve.

“There were lessons learnt here,” he said. “All I can do is apologise that we did not meet expectations. Beyond that, we will take criticism and put it into planning for the future. Don’t miss out on a great show from a great band in the future because of this.”

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