This year’s Bloc weekend has been cancelled half way through after the site in London’s Docklands struggled to cope with the size of the crowds. The Quietus was present at the event, which took place at The London Pleasure Gardens, a temporary event space surrounding the Millennium Flour Mill.
From early on, it seemed as if there were issues with overcrowding, with an extremely long queue to get in the site, and arguably over-zealous searches on the way in. Then during the event itself, each venue seemed to be at capacity with many queuing outside, in addition to the people milling around the site. At times, the crush to get onto the MS Stubnitz was alarming, though it must be said security seemed to be doing their best with a difficult situation.
As yet, Bloc have just issued a statement on their website thus: "By now everyone will have heard that Bloc 2012 was closed due to crowd safety concerns. We are all absolutely devastated that this happened, but the safety of everyone on site was paramount. Given the situation on the ground, we feel that it was the right decision to end the show early. Bloc will not open on Saturday 7th July so please don’t come to the site. Stand by for full information on refunds."
We hope to have more information on what exactly happened and who was responsible, whether Bloc or the London Pleasure Gardens who ran the site, soon. Let’s not speculate wildly and without the full facts. One thing, though: who is the bright spark who thought ‘Crowd Surge’ was a good name for a festival ticketing company?
Various promoters, including Plex (whose team-up with Perc Trax we were immensely looking forward to) are trying to set up alternative events tonight.
