Rock Im Park Weathers Storm

A torrential downpour forced Deadmau5 to cut his set to 40 minutes on the closing night of Rock Im Park but German promoter Marek Lieberberg was happy to report that otherwise his festivals enjoyed “a hassle-free weekend.”

Concerned about safety, local police stepped in when the winds picked up. The main-stage acts had already finished and the 8,000 or so fans watching Deadmau5 realised the weather was beginning to cause problems.

Lieberberg reminded the near 84,000-capacity crowd at the beginning of Rock am Ring that lives are more important than music. He told Pollstar he was pleased the event sent out a clear signal on crowd management and that there were no problems with people entering or leaving the site.

He was critical of Duisburg Mayor Adolf Sauerland last summer, claiming it was “criminal” to allow the techno street festival Love Parade to go ahead on the city’s former railway freight depot, where a crowd crush claimed 21 lives.

Lieberberg’s crowd safety measures at his huge twinned festivals won him a special honour at Germany’s Live Entertainment Awards earlier this year but at the time Lieberberg was at odds with the organisers and he controversially decided not to collect the award.

Lieberberg also broke new ground for himself this year by spending time at both his June 3 and June 5 events. Normally he would be among the crowd at Rock Am Ring on the Neuburgring Formula One motor racing circuit, but on the Saturday morning he charted a plane to make what was literally a flying visit to the Rock Im Park site at Nuremburg.

Both sites fell short of a selling out but Lieberberg said it wasn’t so far short that anyone would have noticed. There were 55,300 at Nuremberg, which brought the total attendance to 139,300, about 15,000 shy of the 155,000 that attended last year’s record-breaking 25th anniversary sellout.

The acts pleasing the crowds included Coldplay, Kings Of Leon, System Of A Down, Social Distortion, The Gaslight Anthem, Rob Zombie, White Lies, Volbeat and Interpol.