On Thursday, Ottawa Bluesfest’s reputation as one of Canada’s premier music festivals was smeared.

Festival-goers came out in droves to catch popular hip-hop trio Migos and solo artist Lil Yachty. While the excitement was pervasive, things went downhill fast as hordes of people squeezed in tight, seeking the best spot. Certain individuals started hurling objects and acting violently toward security.

It doesn’t take long to find comments on social media or media websites about the harmful effects of hip hop, many of which decry its incorporation into Bluesfest.

I was surprised to find so many comments of this nature, which, frankly, were loaded with obvious racist undertones.

I mean, I take comment sections with a grain of salt.

But the notion that hip hop is the root of this problem seems to be a perspective shared by more than just a few misguided commenters.

It reveals a significant divide between an older generation, who think they wrote the book on live music, and a younger and more boisterous generation, which has little experience in crowded festivals where drugs and alcohol are rampant.

Hip hop is not the problem. Intoxicants, inexperienced concert-goers and a few bad apples are. People who think hip hop should be banned from festivals are, at best, misinformed, and at worst revealing their inner racist.

Dangerous situations at music festivals are not a new phenomenon and are certainly not exclusive to hip-hop performances.

Over the years, at shows of all kinds, there has been violence, trampling, sexual assaults, suffocation/crushing, overdoses and over-intoxication.

For whatever reason, on Thursday at Bluesfest, some thought being violent and pushing back against authority was OK, while simultaneously harming innocent audience members — some were reported to be throwing beer cans and rocks.

Drugs and alcohol make people do things they wouldn’t normally do. On Thursday night, underage people were taken to CHEO, and more than 200 people were examined for drugs, alcohol use and injuries.

This is a clear indicator of a problem.

Backup paramedics had to be called in to help support the on-site crew, administering treatment for suspected opiate overdoses, as well as injuries caused by falls. Organizers and stringent security can’t prevent people from doing drugs in private settings — they can only try to prevent illicit drug and alcohol consumption in and around the festival site.

In fact, a recent Canadian study found that alcohol and drugs were a main factor in 13 per cent of all reported music festival deaths worldwide between 1999 and 2014, and the majority (75 per cent) of all non-traumatic deaths.

Drugs, alcohol and a gigantic crowd of young people who are not experienced in handling dangerous intoxicants and scenarios combine to make a poisonous concoction.

People need to stop focusing on the rappers — or hip hop in general — as being the catalyst.

We must learn from this incident and continue to develop and institute more preventative measures so that drug and alcohol consumption are mitigated, while also targeting unruly concert-goers before their actions incite more disruptive behaviour by crowds, which can lead to grievous harm at music festivals.



Matías Muñoz is editor of the local online music publication Ottawa Showbox.