This is bass generators Response: Right folks i've not been hiding, it was my birthday weekend so I've had 2 days off from the world. First off I'd like to say thanks to all who turned out on Saturday. Secondly I'd like to say thanks to everyone who helped out with the promotion of this event, I'm sure without all of your effort it would not have gone ahead. Finally I'd like to say thanks to all of the artists, with extra props to the following..... Daz Attack=Legend (possibly the best stage performance I've ever seen him do, best PA mc in the world, no doubt!!). Mc Loco=what mc'ing to dj's is all about. Scott Brown (dancing for Neurotek)=holy shit that kid can dance, best I've ever seen!!! Clarky=Excellent dj!! (for filling in for my hardstyle set as I couldn't get away from sorting shit out). Joey Riot+Kurt=Top PA. (shame they had to go on to so few people, not too sure about the singing!! ). Hyperbass=see them a few times but that performance was top drawer! Selector c=top dj, tune selection was spot on!! Catscan=came a long way, played the smallest gig of his career but loved it! Everything went reasonably smoothly, there was no bother and by the look of all the posts on here and other forums everyone had a great time and are looking forward to the next one (if we decide to do a next one). You'll notice that the flyers and posters were not handed out at the end of the night, the next provisional date is July 5th which is only 3 weeks away. I have the job of deciding whether to go ahead with this event or cancel all future planned events at that venue. WHY? On Tuesday 10th June Judgement Day was effectively canceled. We had a phone call from the venue management informing us that the police had filed an objection to the license, they basically believed that the event would be full of underage, drugged up, drunk, aggressive low-lifes. They said they simply could not allow a "rave" event to go ahead in Newcastle city centre. We spent most of the day trying to convince them that "ravers" weren't like that anymore and all of the bother that was caused at the venue in the late 90's was caused by a minority of troublemakers and that they would never have gotten away with it if there was adequate security at the venue. We offered to pay a lot more to have a lot more security back then but the venue manager wouldn't agree to it. Who knows why, maybe he thought that if there was bother at every event the university management would pull the event. They did! So on Tuesday we managed to get the police to agree to allow the event to go ahead but they said we had to increase the security and also have them on site keeping an eye on things. This isn't a free service, in fact it's very costly. We had to make a quick decision whether to agree to pay out for this cover or cancel the event. The production costs and artist costs had already been budgeted for and all artist wages had been made up and ready for Saturday night. We now had an extra cost to pay upfront, the only way to pay this was to use the saved artist money. The venue also told us that they wanted to hold onto all ticket money including the money taken on the door so that they could use it to pay for any damages occurring during the event. We did a ticket count and found out that only 150 tickets had been sold. I rang around some other local promoters to get their input and they all assured me that 150 tickets in advance was a good amount. People in the North-East just didn't buy tickets anymore, just paid on the door. Judgement day at Digital only did 100-200 tickets and got 800-1000 paying on the door. D.O.D at the Carling was the same and so were a few other events. On that information we decided to go ahead with the event, to be safe though I emailed all of the artists and explained the situation. The email fully explained 2 main points!. 1. If the turnout on the night had been poor we would be unable to pay the artists their full fees, the money we set aside to ensure the artists were paid had to be given to the police and venue security in order for the event to go ahead. 2. If the turnout was good we would still be unable to pay the artists on the night but would sort all fees out in the following week either by cheque or bank transfer. ALL of the artists replied and said they understood and were happy with that! (including M-zone). Some of the artists (mainly the ones traveling a long distance) asked us to keep them informed as to how the ticket sales were going. None of them wanted to drive all the way to Newcastle if there was no money available. By Friday 13th the ticket sales had picked up well and there were 350 sold, going by all the other events and assured by all the local promoters that that was a fantastic amount of tickets to have sold we re-confirmed to the artists that everything would be good and there wouldn't be any problems with their wages. There should be no reason why we wouldn't have 1000 people wanting to pay on the door which would have made this event a sell out. On Saturday at 5pm we did another ticket count and we had done 450 tickets. This was 100% going to be rammed! We rang a few more of the artists who were waiting for news and confirmed all was good. 9pm doors opened and there was a huge queue outside. As you know (if you went) the security was very tight and the searches were completely over the top. Some people have commented that the security told them it was because they didn't want ravers inside their venue and we will endeavor to find out who they were. They had no right to make comments like that they were being paid by us to do their job, not put people off. It took far too long to get everyone in, Lethal theory were supposed to be on at 10pm but there were only about 200 in by then. I had to ask them to go on 30 minutes later so a few more would get in.At about 11pm I went up to the front door to see what the hold up was but by then the huge queue had disappeared, nearly all inside by then, we checked and there had only been 50 tickets sold on the door. How that happened I have no idea? How can other events sell so many on the door but ours didn't?? The total amount inside was just under 600, there were 88 guests/artists/jd staff on top of 450 ticket holders and 50 payed on the door. There were a few extra guests allowed in, mates etc who turned up out of the blue and daz attack + his mates and dj scott who I admit I did forget to put on the guest list, it was a busy stressful day and I missed a few people "big wow!". Mikey b was on the door so anyone who wasn't on the list got straight in, it wasn't like they had to pay or wait or beg etc. he knew them! So were back to 11.30pm, the event is going well, the people in there were well spread out and having a good time so it looked good. We did one more check on the door and no one else had come though it and the police decided they were closing it. We had a handful of cash from the door sales which had to be spilt between all of the artists. Remember all of these artists had been warned on Tuesday that there was a chance they wouldn't get paid for performing and all of these artists had replied and agreed that this was ok with them, it happens! most were just happy to be on at the event as they hoped it was going to be an ongoing success and would get future bookings out of sticking by us at this one. We sorted out the bands expenses first as they had a lot of set up costs, petrol costs and hotels etc. What was left was to be paid to the dj's, as we had 2 who had flown from holland+germany we sorted them first. That was all of the money gone. I knew Mzone was doing a 11-12 spot down south somewhere and he had asked on tuesday that i rang him if there was a problem as he didn't want to make the drive up if it was going to be a waste of time. He was driving up north and would be passing by where he lived so he wasn't exactly out of his way. I texted him at 11.45 to say not to come up here as it was a "write off" which it was. He rang me back just after 12 to say ok mate no worries, shame it was dead. Like I said the money which was set aside to pay the artists had to be paid to the police/venue in order for the event to go ahead. We or rather Mikey doesn't have bottomless pockets finding £5000 in a couple of days is impossible for most! Mzone has wrongly accused us of simply bumping him to save money, he has done so because someone has told him there was loads of people there. There are only 3 people who know how many were in there and that is... 1. Mikey 2. Head of security 3. Cashier No one can stand in a venue and accurately count how many people are there. I've been to 40+ Judgement day events at the Uni and I can't do it. So there you have it if you really care! so by general rule of thumb, dont book an event at the Uni - they just seem to kill the buzz everytime. unlucky lads
He add's: Out of the 500 paying in I estimate that 250 were from Scotland. That means only 250 people from the North-East bothered their arses to come to a heavily promoted, respected, big named event with a great line up at a great venue. I'm seriously disappointed with that and feel the North-East let both us and themselves down. Had we done this event in Scotland it would have attracted 2000-3000 people no bother. stange as fuck since digitals been going really well
I went and had a good night, not as busy as it used to be but was good to catch up with peple, my mates took ages to come in with the ques like as Bassy said. They were queing for an hour and were really strict searches but once in everyone was having a good time, never seen any bother, have seen more bother at some nights in Digital. Bad crack from the police as my mate works at the Academy where they have Decade of Dance and he says there is fihgting there everytime but they still are allowed to put them on. Shame if it doesnt go ahead but was good for once last rave to Neurotek
I know about 10 people who woulda been there but it was Defcon instead. Theres a chance that might have hindered ticket sales
thats a proper fuking shame like i was their and it was a class nite, I hope they is more it would be a shame for it not to carry on
