|
Well, let's go through this step by step and go back in time two years.
Ascension 2000. The "biggest rave event the city has aver seen" (according to Keith). Sportex, over 5000 tickets have been sold. Paul Oakenfold is headlining, alongside with Max Graham and some other people. Good lineup.
Well, Mr. Rebuliak seems to be so confident in his skill as a promoter (this is his first major party, his second "rave" event in Edmonton). In his infinite wisdom he decides to invite the local TV stations, newspapers, and city officials to come check out the party because he's such an honest promoter and party people should trust his judgement. May I stress again that this is his second event in Edmonton.
Night of the party. People arrive to find a lineup stretching around half the venue. Also, people arrive to find Ephedrine tablets being given away at the door. Attendees who have arrived at the published door-opening times are waiting for 4-5 hours outside. Many ticketholders don't even make it in, while door ticket sales are still going (for a rather substantial amount of money).
At this point, the police is all over the place, city mayor is making an appearence as well. The entrance is blocked, they're letting in only one person at a time and checking them for several minutes. It is obvious that the whole event is horribly understaffed and an organisational nightmare.
To add to the catastrophe, early in the morning six people collapse of strobe light triggered epilepsy attacks. Media is of course all over this one, labeling them as (alledged) ecstasy overdoses. While this isn't directly Def-Star's fault, they should have known the effects of strobe lights and should have set them up according to the space available (I believe those were 4x1500w strobe lights in a room that is barely 10m wide). Again, an official press release is promised but it was never published. Media takes this as an admission of guilt.
Fallout. Media is all over the scene, while Keith decides again, in his infinite wisdom to take the place of spokesperson for all the promoters and partygoers in Edmonton. This wouldn't be bad if he wasn't spewing absolute crap comments, which ended up doing MUCH more harm than good. In retrospect, Ascension was the event that turned the media and city officials against raves. Many people argue that this would have happened sooner or later, but I'm certain it wouldn't have had such a major impact if it happened at a properly organised event. Also it wouldn't bring the parties in such an extremely negative light - if you see the way Calgary bylaw developed you can definitely see a much lesser degree of animosity of city officials towards parties because Calgary never had such a fiasco in their history. Keith's efforts basically ruined months of preparations and work of other promoters who triet to lay a frams for a future "rave bylaw", not to mention pull the scrutiny of the general public upon the scene.
Aftermath. A free event is promised for all the wristband holders, alongside with refunds for all the people who didn't get in despite having a ticket. Neither happened. I know people who still have their tickets as a reminder not to attend Def-Star parties. Def-Star is proverbialyy tarred and feathered, they move their base of operations to Calgary, leaving Edmonton promoters to deal with the mess that he created.
A few months down the road, Def-Star attempts to throw another event in Edmonton (a club night this time). Zero turnout. Keith Rebuliak proceeds to post a long rand on the official Def-Star website about how the Edmonton party scene is dead because of decreasing quality of drugs and because of people being drug burn-outs. Public outrage, people who were ready to forgive and forget again have vendettas against Def Star. After a failed collaboration with United Productions, Def Star pretty much gave up on ever re-establishing a good reputation in Edmonton.
Sporadic incidents still occured involving Edmonton DJs getting screwed over and not getting paid for their services, dishonoring of contracts as well as flame wars and name calling through various means.
Well, now that you know most of the facts, you might be able to understand why Edmonton hates Defstar and their head clown Keith Rebuliak.
btw. J-spot, the reason Def-Star throws joint ventures with other production companies is mostly to be able to shift blame away from themselves in case things go wrong. This happened with their collaboration with United here in Edmonton; United was nothing more than a scapegoat and a facade behind which DefStar could still try and operate in Edmonton. Why do you think United broke off collaboration with such a "major promoter"?
Last edited by Lars Northrop on Jun-23-2002 at 23:16
|
