Crowd surfing

Crowd surfing

Crowd surfing describes the process in which a person is passed overhead from person to person during a concert, transferring the person from one part of the venue to another. The "crowd surfer" is passed above everyone's heads, with everyone's hands supporting the person's weight.

At most concerts and festivals the crowd surfer will be passed towards a barrier in front of the stage by the crowd, where they will be pulled off and put onto their feet by the security stewards. Then, they will be sent back to the side or rear of the crowd at the end of the barrier or they may be ejected from the venue (depending on the policy enforced). Some venues operate a zero tolerance policy towards surfing where any surfer will be automatically thrown out, but most operate a "two / three strikes and out" policy where only persistent offenders are punished.

Crowd surfing generally occurs only towards the front of an audience where the crowd is dense enough to support a person's body. It is most popular at metal, punk, rock and indie concerts. At some genre concerts, such as folk and classical music, crowdsurfing is unheard of because the audience density will not be sufficient to hold up an audience member and also because these concerts are usually seated. In addition, it could be said that audiences of folk and similar musical genres are less susceptible to such behaviour because of common social values against such activities.

In order to get above everyone's heads, a person can be given a boost, in which one person picks up another to launch them over the peoples' heads, or they can stage dive.

Dangers of crowd surfing

Sign at the 2004 Reading Festival

In 2000, at the Roskilde Festival festival, nine people died and several were wounded because they were trampled during a Pearl Jam concert (also see CNN). Since then, crowd surfing has been made illegal at most festivals and concerts in Europe, and patrons can, in theory, be ejected from the venue for partaking in the act. This is usually written on the small-print of festival tickets. However as people rarely get thrown out for crowd surfing, it seems that the ban exists simply because companies running the festivals want legal protection from potential injury claims against them stemming from moshing or crowd surfing at these events.

Critics of crowd surfing argue that injuries can frequently occur when a surfer is accidentally dropped by the crowd onto the floor (sometimes head first, to be trampled below). Also, innocent concert goers below can sometimes be injured when a surfer lands on top of them, occasionally with some force. Sometimes audience members are accidentally kicked in the face and the upper body by crowd surfers. Scratches are sometimes caused by zippers or studs on clothing. Some audience members can be knocked over by crowd surfers causing them to be trampled by the dancing crowd.

Supporters of crowd surfing say that by standing in the mosh pit patrons should expect such behaviour as part of a rock show and by standing more towards the side or rear of the venue they can easily avoid such behaviour. Such people also state that serious injuries caused by crowd surfing are extremely rare. It is true that the majority of injuries caused by crowd surfing are only mild bruising, which occurs in any mosh pit without crowd surfing. Supporters will also argue that most crowd surfers are considerate and will wear soft shoes such as trainers, and refrain from wearing jackets in order to minimize injuries, and that it is common mosh pit etiquette to pick up anyone who has fallen over.

Crowd surfers also risk having personal items such as wallets or mobile phones stolen, or their shoes or clothes removed and thrown into inconvenient locations. This is known as "mosh-lobbing," usually done by audience members or even performers who see crowd surfing as a pointless and MTV-saturated activity. Female crowd surfers may be groped by male audience members, although this is often frowned upon by other members of the crowd.

Within the rock concert community some individuals consider crowd surfing and stage diving to be a fine art and will often boast about any injuries they have sustained in the act.

In December 2004 when the Beastie Boys performed at the MEN arena in Manchester, England, Ad Rock stopped partway through a song to warn the crowds to stop surfing as somebody had been injured, following up the discouragement with 'that shit is so old' and telling them to 'save that shit for the MTV music awards'.

Many Festivals (Such as Cornerstone) disallow crowd surfing mainly because their insurance does not cover it. Those who attempt to surf who have not had a warning are told not to, otherwise they may be ejected from the concert. Those who have had warnings are ejected immediately.

At some shows, such as performances by The Aquabats, it is common for members of the audience to retaliate crowd surfing by removing the shoes of crowd surfers and throwing them on the floor so the surfer can not reach them.

Trivia

Crowd surfing occurs during many concerts by Rammstein. One particular example occurs halfway through the performance of "Stripped" at Les Arènes de Nîmes, in which Oliver Riedel gets into a rubber dinghy and "surfs" from the stage, some distance into the crowd, and back to the stage. This stunt used to be performed by Christian Lorenz. However he stopped as he was injured too many times, and Oliver Riedel performs this stunt in his place.

See also

• Stage diving
• Moshing
• Headbanging
• Air guitar
• List of dances
• R.T. Rybak (possibly the only mayor of a major city to have crowd surfed)