Fans are praising Playboi Carti and his team after a safety announcement was made ahead of his Inglewood, California concert on Saturday.
TikTok user @cantmakedecisions4myself started recording the announcement as it was in progress, tagging the video #astroworldfest. The video garnered over 486,000 views in 17 hours. It has since been taken down from the platform.
“We’re here to do a show for you. You need to cooperate. This is the only way this show happens tonight,” the announcer said. “We need everybody to take a few steps back and cooperate. If you have seats up top, you need to stay up top. It’s the only way tonight happens. There is no other way. This show is now based on how you guys cooperate tonight.”
Concert safety has become a major topic of discussion following Astroworld Festival in Houston, Texas, which left eight dead and hundreds of others injured.
Investigation into what happened is still underway, but many have already placed blamed on the organizers, which include performer Travis Scott, for not having enough security or protocols in place to properly wrangle a crowd of that size. Scott is also facing scrutiny as some feel he didn’t do enough to discourage dangerous behavior and ultimately didn’t stop the concert as quickly as it should have been stopped.
In the aftermath of Astroworld, videos of other musicians stopping their sets, such as Dave Grohl, Linkin Park, and Adele, circulated online as part of a larger conversation around concert safety. Old video footage of Playboy Carti stopping his Lollapalooza set was also brought up as an example of how to control a crowd.
The announcement at Playboi Carti’s show on Nov. 6 may have been a response to what happened at Astroworld, but recent chaos that caused the rapper’s Houston show to be canceled may have also played a role.
Just two weeks ago, fans damaged the venue’s barriers and metal detectors while waiting in line for the concert. The Houston Police Department called for back up to handle the commotion, and allegedly advised that the concert be canceled due to the out of control crowd.
“We showed up like an hour early and everybody started going crazy,” concertgoer Jordan Martinez told Click2Houston. “It was chaos. It was a war zone honestly. It was mosh pits, fights and everything.”
Regardless of the impetus for the announcement, fans appreciated the concern for safety.
“This is how you control a crowd, this is imperative to keep everyone safe,” wrote @kathiagiselle_.
“More shows should do this,” @michaellabranche agreed.
“YES!! this is normal!! every show i’ve ever been to took care of the crowd before it started,” @guyfierifan420 said.
@redtacco 23 optimistically suggested that “other artists will look at what happened to Travis as learning experience bc these concerts were going unchecked for so long.”
And at least one additional TikToker in the comments claimed to have been at Playboi Carti’s Los Angeles show and said “everyone took care of each other.”
Update 7:56 pm CT Nov. 8: In an email to the Daily Dot, the TikToker, Kasha, said the audience at the Playboi Carti concert was respectful of the rules. She added that, following Astroworld, she hopes “things will change” to improve concert and festival safety.
“While outdoor festivals do not have the same regulations that indoor venues have, Travis’s festival did not properly prepare for their mass audience and blatantly disregarded the cries for help,” Kasha said. “Coachella has five times as many attendees and keeps things safe. Many other artists in this genre and other genres tend to stop their show until an issue is resolved, and some insist on stopping the show entirely if the crowd is not following instructions. Travis and his team were not meeting the level of professionalism other festivals adhere to, and other artists showcase. That is why a lot of blame is being put on him.”
She added that announcements like the one at Playboi Carti’s show aren’t uncommon. Artists often stop shows when the crowd becomes unsafe, and Kasha hopes that becomes more of a concrete standard moving forward.
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