Radiohead drum tech dies in stage collapse

Milt Hathaway

Senior Member
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/story/2012-06-17/radiohead-stage-collapse/55651888/1

"Investigators combed through the wreckage of a Toronto stage Sunday to determine what caused the structure to come crashing down ahead of a Radiohead concert, killing the band's drum technician and injuring three other people.

The British band said it was devastated over the death of Scott Johnson, a U.K. citizen in his 30s who was trapped under the rubble and pronounced dead at the scene."
 
A terrible thing to happen. The band did the right thing by calling the concert off and my sympathies obviously goes to all of those who knew and loved Mr. Johnson.

Fortunately this is a fairly rare event in this day and age but it doesn't make what has happened any less tragic or easy to reconcile.
 
What terrible news. I'd read that there was a casualty but I didn't realize it was a member of the band's crew.

My daugther just saw the band in concert last week, a much-anticipated show that was their first in Detroit in 15 years.
 
A terrible accident indeed, I really feel for the family and friends of Mr Johnson.

As one of the "witness" said in the article, could you imagine if it happened during the concert!!

You just wonder how something like this can happen, dont they use the same stage everywhere they go?
 
I thought what Coyne from the Flaming Lips was pretty classy.


Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne paid tribute to Radiohead throughout the show, including performing a cover of Radiohead's Knives Out, which he introduced saying "peace be with their hearts tonight."

Nicely done
 
Fortunately this is a fairly rare event in this day and age

In Canada, one person died and several people were injured when the stage went down at Bluesfest in Ottawa last July, and one person died and more than a dozen were injured in 2009 when a powerful windstorm caused the main stage to collapse at the Big Valley Jamboree near Camrose.
Six people died last August when the stage collapsed at a Sugarland concert in Indianapolis; five died in Belgium when a storm swept in and toppled the stage at the Pukkelpop Festival.


Sounds like it's less rare than I might have imagined.
 
Very sad and awful. Strange how there wasn't a storm or anything - the stage just collapsed.
Truly shocking, & my thoughts are with those more closely affected than I.

You would think that the structure was finished by the time instrument crew were on stage, but maybe it wasn't. Structures are at their most vulnerable mid construction, so maybe that had a bearing on events. I remember a lighting truss incident many years ago, where two crew were badly injured, & that was due in part to shortcuts within a tight schedule.

Whatever the cause, it's a sad day in the drumming community.
 
I remember that the stage collapsed when swedish DJ Avicii held a concert for people under 18 in Stockholm. Luckily, no one died.

When I went on a concert with Nazareth a couple of years ago, they stacked some amps on top of each other. One fell down and alm ost hit the bassist.
 
Very sad for all involved, from all I have read, he sounded like a nice guy, a drummer himself who got an opportunity to tech., and ran with it.

There have been a number of well documented incidents like this recently, some weather related some not, surely it must be about time that some form of limitation is imposed on the size and or design of these structures to help prevent future incidents.
 
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