In 1987 Iron Maiden was out on tour to support their sixth studio album ‘Somewhere in Time.’
I had previously talked about the promotion for the album when iron maiden famously appeared
on german television and was told they had to lip sync their performance.
They had a lot of fun with aht appearance.
The link to that story is down below.
But in today’s video I want to talk about a concert that iron maiden played in the united
states that resulted in a riot and the news media unfairly pointing finger at heavy metal.
On March 28, 1987 Iron Maiden was playing a show in East Rutherford New Jersey at the
Meadowlands arena..
While the concert appeared to mostly go off without a hitch, it was what happened after
the concert that made the news.While a lot of the news reports focused on what happened
after the show witnesses and concert attendees, painted a different picture than the news
media..
Their statements foreshadowed what was to happen that night.
Iron maiden’s show would end around 11pm and
the Star-Ledger would interview a 14 year old attendee named Jason Kalfin, who indicated
trouble was starting even before the iron maiden concert.
Him and some friends were tailgating in the parking lot recalling
"Everybody's hanging out, listening to music and all of a sudden a bottle smashes near
us,".
Other would soon follow and him and his friends would run into the arena to get away from
the escalating tension in the parking lot.
Things apparently got rowdy inside the venue during the show as one witness claimed attendees
in the nose bleeds were hurling fire crackers onto people below them.
These actions resulted in Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson warning the crowd to knock
it off.
The paper would also interview a 17 year old concert attendee named john mulligan who recalled
what happened after he left the concert venue around 11am.
stating
"The parking lot was bedlam," "Everybody drinking, cranking music, breaking bottles."
Meanwhile, another attendee Tony Kingslow who was 15 at the time recalled "You were
crunching on glass," It was just a mess.
Bottles everywhere, glass everywhere, you saw rags with blood on it.
You couldn't believe that happened.
He would go on to reveal how people soon started their own fire in the parking lot adding "There
was a huge circle of people around it, throwing everything and anything in the fire, We hung
out until we were almost hit with some flying bottles."
The police would report that most of the mayhem occurred between 11pm to 1 am.
Two cars in the venue’s parking lot were burnt and overturned & responding officers
and firefighters were reportedly targeted with flying bottles and debris.
A total of 33 people would be arrested ranging in age from 15-22 mostly on charges of disorderly
conduct.
A revised investigative report would reveal that a good number of arrests were actually
made before the concert took place & while there would be no serious injuries, one responding
officer was lightly injured when his car was struck by a 17 year old intoxicated attendee
who was backing up his vehicle.
That attendee would be charged with aggravated assault The fall out from the riot would result
in alcohol sales being banned at the venue before shows and city officials considered
banning heavy metal shows from the venue.
The concert promoters and owners of the venue would downplay the events stating that no
one was seriously injured and that the actions that happened in the parking lot was the work
of a small handful of people, pointing to around 18,000 attendees who were mostly well
behaved.
The news program 20/20 would even cover the event and heavy metal music was in the media
spotlight.
You had Tipper Gore and her group the PMRC, which fought hard to censor rock music and
then you had some high profile events happen in heavy metal world.
You had the infamous Judas Priest riot at madison square garden in new york a few years
prior an event i previously covered on my channel, the link is down below.
On top of that, in the weeks leading up to the iron maiden show in east rutherford, several
teens who appeared to be iron maiden fans took their own lives in bergenfield, new jersey.
Some in the media pointed the finger at iron maiden for being responsible for these deaths
and something similar would happen to Ozzy Osbourne well resulting in a lawsuit, something
that the prince of darkness would be exonerated in.
Iron Maiden's publicist would release a statement after the riot that read "Iron Maiden fans
come to listen to music; they don't come to fight,""We just can't be held accountable
for the actions of a few hooligans.
Here’s a clip from 20/20 talking about the riot and what was going on in heavy metal
at the time.
Good evening, it was rock n' roll turned ugly.
a rock riot topped the new jersey tops the local news.
There were nearly 3 dozen arrests and a state trooper was injured.
A post-concert fight captures the headlines.
A parking lot disturbance at one arena leaves police to mobilize an army at the group's
next stop.
At issue the impact of this loud rauckous music, heavy metal music played here by the
supergroup Iron Maiden.
This is not mainstream rock n' roll.
It's the music of today's teen rebellion What's it about.
Togetherness man, we gotta stick together.
We gotta fight, one giant familyk we gotta fight for our right man to listen to our music
and party.
That's what annoys the hell out of me that people are saying we are a negative influence.
I just wish that people would get a sense of proportion of what's right or wrong and
who are the real people that are poisoning people's minds and why are they doing it.
We say things to people that mean something to people in our own little way that kids
can relate to.
Iron maiden would end up returning to the arena a year later, but there wouldn’t be
a repeat of what happened in 1987 and that so called ban on heavy metal acts would just
remain as a thought.
That does it for today's video guys thanks for watching.
Be sure to hit the like button and subscribe and we'll see you again on rock n' roll true
stories.
Take care