Vegetables and bread are for eating, not expressing disapproval. That's just one of many reasons why these famous musicians decided that they couldn't take it anymore as they stormed off stage.
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00:00Vegetables and bread are for eating, not expressing disapproval.
00:04That's just one of many reasons why these famous musicians decided that they couldn't
00:09take it anymore as they stormed offstage.
00:12The Doors frontman Jim Morrison owned every stage he ever set foot on, but he wasn't just
00:17a simple showman.
00:18His performances were always opportunities to experiment.
00:21As he once said,
00:22"...I am interested in anything about revolt, disorder, chaos, especially activity that
00:27seems to have no meaning.
00:28It seems to me to be the road toward freedom."
00:31Morrison wanted his listeners to shatter boundaries and inhibitions, but he broke a boundary in
00:36a different way in New Orleans on December 12, 1970, the night of his final live performance
00:41with the Doors.
00:42He technically didn't storm off the stage.
00:45Instead, he stormed through it.
00:47As Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek described it, Morrison's spirit exited his body as he
00:52reportedly smashed a hole in the stage with his mic stand before walking offstage.
00:58Then he just sat down onstage and didn't get up.
01:00This all happened less than a year before Morrison's untimely death at the age of 27
01:05in July 1971.
01:07Madonna is no stranger to blowing up, whether that's with a hit single or a profanity-laden
01:13rant.
01:14Some of her most notorious moments include her disastrous interview with David Letterman
01:18in 1994 or fighting lawsuits from angry fans for starting her concerts hours late.
01:24Considering all that, it should come as no surprise that the queen of pop has threatened
01:28on more than one occasion, the most memorable case being in Santiago, Chile, in 2012.
01:34Madonna was approaching the end of her MDNA tour, which had become one of the highest
01:38grossing of all time by the end of that year.
01:41But she couldn't help but get hung up before this particular show even began, as she reportedly
01:46spotted a group of smokers in the audience during her soundcheck and stopped mid-song.
01:51She then said,
01:52"'No smoking.'
01:53If you're going to smoke cigarettes, I'm not doing a show.
01:55You don't care about me, I don't care about you, all right?
01:58Are we going to play that game?
02:00I'm not kidding.
02:01I can't sing if you smoke."
02:02After the group seemingly ignored Madonna's plea, she then stormed offstage.
02:07Things didn't exactly improve from there, as the performance began two hours late in
02:12a torrential downpour, only to eventually end 40 minutes early.
02:17Before he decided to stop touring in 2023, Art Garfunkel had maintained some modest success
02:24as a legacy act outside of his chart-topping partnership with Paul Simon.
02:28But he also faced some serious bumps in the road, most notably an injury that almost caused
02:32him to lose his voice.
02:34In 2010, he was forced to indefinitely delay an entire summer reunion tour with Simon,
02:40as well as several of his own solo shows.
02:42Three years later, he had recovered to the point that he was ready to play small concerts
02:46again, which included an acoustic set at the Great Neck Arts Center in Long Island, New
02:51York.
02:52In the end, an intimate rehearsal, the show was an invite-only, two-night event that came
02:56with a few unexpected moments.
02:58As reported by Page Six, a woman was so overtaken by excitement at seeing Garfunkel live that
03:03she fainted and was escorted out of the venue by stretcher.
03:07As if that weren't enough excitement, Garfunkel then left the stage soon afterwards when someone
03:12in the front row struggled to turn off his cell phone after it began buzzing.
03:16He apologized shortly afterwards to the singer, who did eventually return to the stage to
03:20finish the set a few minutes later.
03:23Fort Collins, Colorado is home to the annual Taste of Fort Collins, a two-day food and
03:28music festival that features both local artists and international headliners.
03:32In 2015, the musical lineup included Smash Mouth.
03:35The event also welcomed Bimbo Bakeries USA, who were giving out free slices of bread to
03:41attendees.
03:42This reportedly resulted in several of those slices being flung at the stage during Smash
03:46Mouth's set during both days of the festival.
03:49According to the festival organizer, Smash Mouth frontman Steve Harwell left the stage
03:54toward the end of his band's set on the second day and was told that an announcement would
03:58be made requesting that people stop throwing bread.
04:01However, before they could say anything, Harwell barreled back on stage and began threatening
04:06audience members in a three-minute rant before the show's encore.
04:10Things got so intense that he began making his way toward the crowd, ready to pick a
04:14fight.
04:15After he was restrained by a security guard, his bandmates started playing their final
04:19song, All Star, and Harwell eventually calmed down and sang along with the crowd.
04:24I don't see Smash Mouth anywhere!"
04:27In 2013, Selena Gomez was fully ready to break free of her Disney origins.
04:32Her show Wizards of Waverly Place had just ended, and she cut ties with her band The
04:37Scene to go solo.
04:38She also released the chart-topping single, Come and Get It, as well as her first number
04:43one album, Starstance.
04:45Then a moment towards the end of the year would fully remove the Disney gloss, though
04:49probably not in the way she intended.
04:51Gomez was on the bill at that year's Jingle Ball, an annual holiday concert hosted by
04:56Kiss FM in Los Angeles.
04:58It's a major moment for any artist, so it wasn't exactly surprising when Gomez became
05:02visibly upset when her microphone and earpiece were malfunctioning right from the start of
05:07her set.
05:08Not only did it reveal that she was lip-syncing, but she was also heard angrily dropping an
05:13F-bomb.
05:14She attempted some self-deprecating humor to appease the audience, many of whom were
05:18young fans, and she promised to perform two more songs.
05:21However, she instead dropped her microphone and walked off stage.
05:25Some old wounds were reopened for rock star Courtney Love when a fan held up a picture
05:29of her late husband Kurt Cobain during a concert in 2011.
05:33As reported by NME, Love was playing with her band Hole at Brazil's Starts With You
05:38music and arts festival.
05:40After catching a glimpse of the photo, she said,
05:42"'I don't need to see a picture of Kurt.
05:44I have to live with his s— and his ghost and his kid every day and throwing that up
05:48is stupid and rude and I'm going to beat the f— out of you if you do it again.'"
05:52Love then stormed off stage, though she eventually returned after her guitarist convinced the
05:57audience to chant,
05:58"'The Foo Fighters are gay.'"
05:59Dave Grohl, the Foo Fighters frontman, was one of Cobain's Nirvana bandmates.
06:04Love and Grohl's relationship has been fraught over the years following contentious litigation
06:08over their shared ownership of Nirvana's estate.
06:11As she explained in an interview following the show,
06:13"'Dave makes $5 million a show.
06:15He doesn't need the money.
06:17Don't say you like the Foo Fighters in front of me or I will walk off stage.'"
06:21"'We used to really like each other and then there was 20 years where we sued each other.'"
06:25As a young heartthrob, Justin Bieber won over legions of fans with songs like Baby and Boyfriend.
06:31But he also got himself into a lot of trouble with a series of DUI and assault charges.
06:35In the process, he became known as less of a teen idol and more of a bad boy prone to
06:40erratic behavior.
06:42Then in 2015, his rebrand into more introspective, EDM-influenced music was marred by a blow-up
06:48on stage in Oslo, Norway.
06:50As reported by Norwegian news agency NTV, Bieber was performing a set that was scheduled
06:55to air on Norwegian TV when he handed a bottle of water to an excitable fan in the front
07:00row.
07:01When she accidentally spilled some of it on the stage, Bieber quickly grabbed a hoodie
07:04to wipe it up.
07:06Though it's difficult to fully make out from the video that was circulated online, it appears
07:10that the fans were trying to grab him or his hoodie.
07:12They continued to do so even after Bieber asked them to stop, and then he stormed off
07:17stage.
07:18Despite the crowd's attempts to send their love with their own rendition of Baby, the
07:22singer never returned to the stage.
07:24He did, however, apologize on Instagram the next day.
07:28It's tough to strike out on your own as a solo artist, and it's even tougher when you've
07:32already agreed to get back together with your once-in-a-generation alt-rock band.
07:36Just ask Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan.
07:39After his first Pumpkins offshoot, Zwan, broke up, he was ready to go solo in 2005 with his
07:45Electronica debut, The Future Embrace.
07:47But then he took out full-page ads in both the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times
07:52on the album's release day to celebrate his new labor of love by announcing that he intended
07:56to return to his original band.
07:58And then, one month later at a solo show in Melbourne, Australia, fans heckled Corgan
08:03to play some Smashing Pumpkins songs.
08:05As reported by Australian outlet Undercover, the crowd was shouting things like,
08:10"'Play some Pumpkins!' and, "'We want rock!'
08:13Corgan responded by suggesting that they get their money back if they were dissatisfied
08:17with his shoegaze stylings.
08:19Their requests wouldn't stop, though, leading Corgan to drop an F-bomb into the mic and
08:23leave the stage.
08:24The fans eventually got what they wanted, as the Pumpkins would release their first
08:28reunion album two years later.
08:30It was nice to kind of get back there and sort of remember where we came from."
08:33It's one thing to take a photo of an artist during a live concert.
08:37It's quite another when they offer to take your phone and snap a custom selfie.
08:41It's a unique but growing trend in live music that presents incredible risks, but also incredible
08:46rewards, which means that entitled fans will reap it for all it's worth.
08:50Some artists have even been hit with phones during shows, and one fan really escalated
08:55the trend during a Steve Lacey concert in 2022.
08:58Lacey was performing in New Orleans when a disposable camera was flung onto the stage.
09:03It grazed his chest and then went back into the audience.
09:06The entire incident was captured in a video that was posted on social media.
09:10Lacey then stopped the concert mid-song, retrieved the camera, and proceeded to destroy it by
09:15throwing it to the ground.
09:17He then quickly exited the stage, had the culprit kicked out, and returned to complete
09:21the set.
09:22Despite some criticism that he had acted entitled, Lacey adamantly defended himself in a since-deleted
09:28Instagram post, as he insisted,
09:30"...I don't believe I owe anyone an apology."
09:32Towards the end of a June 2016 show in Charleston, South Carolina, Death Cab for Cutie were performing
09:41their hit song, Soul Meets Body, when frontman Ben Gibbard suddenly threw his mic down and
09:46stormed offstage.
09:47The moment was recorded by a fan and posted to YouTube, and it felt very out of character
09:51for a musician as laid back as Gibbard.
09:54But the real story was what was happening offstage.
09:57As bassist Nick Harmer later explained to Billboard,
09:59"...it was the last 20 seconds of the last song, and all of Ben's equipment failed at
10:03the exact kind of unrelated moment there was a giant fight in front of us.
10:08It's kind of scary.
10:09So we stop as a band thinking somebody's hurt or something's happening."
10:13In the video, Gibbard can be seen pulling out his earpiece and dropping his guitar in
10:16frustration, after which drummer Jason McGurr stops mid-song to point out the commotion
10:21in the crowd.
10:22All of this culminates in Gibbard lashing out, which was followed by security stepping
10:26in to end the fight.
10:28The band eventually completed the set with an encore, but the entire moment was still
10:32a shock.
10:33Harmer also cited anxiety following the deadly Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando as part
10:38of what influenced their decision to stop the show.
10:40If you're being pelted with water, hopefully it's because you're on an amusement park ride
10:44or sliding down a slip-n-slide, but it shouldn't happen to someone who's on the bill of the
10:48Red Bull Music Academy Tour in Glasgow, Scotland.
10:52Alas, that was what happened to rapper Danny Brown in 2015, who was performing an a cappella
10:57run when a deluge of water hit him from the crowd.
11:00The whole incident was captured on video, though it's unclear whether Brown was hit
11:03with a water bottle or a cup of water.
11:06Either way, it was enough for him to immediately throw the mic to the ground and leave the
11:10stage, never to return, as he reportedly swore that he would never play at Glasgow again
11:15after the incident.
11:16A lot of people were quick to hate on the culprit, a drunk man in his early or mid-twenties
11:20who was promptly escorted out of the venue.
11:22However, some were also quick to criticize Brown, as one of the concert attendees said
11:27to the Glasgow Times,
11:28"...Danny Brown can rap about drugs and guns, but he can't take a pint of water?"
11:32And as another put it on social media,
11:34"...Danny Brown leaving the show cause he gets a drink thrown at him?
11:37Mate, that's a Glasgow christening.
11:39You're a citizen now."
11:40"...Sometimes I lose, sometimes I win."
11:42Azealia Banks and the country of Australia don't exactly get along with each other.
11:47Their feud began back in 2012 when Banks performed a measly 25-minute set at the Byron Bay-based
11:53Splendour in the Grass music festival, as she cited faulty equipment.
11:57She was quite apologetic at the time, promising that she'd come back for another go, and sure
12:02enough, she did.
12:03But it didn't go quite so smoothly.
12:05At the 2013 Future Music Festival in Melbourne, Banks started some Twitter beef with British
12:10rock band The Stone Roses by claiming that they sabotaged her set.
12:14Later that same year, she headlined the Listen Out Festival, where she was hit by a drink
12:1915 minutes into the Sydney leg of her performance.
12:22Needless to say, the music ended right then and there.
12:24The final straw came when another drink was thrown at Banks, this time a full can of beer,
12:29only 90 seconds into her set at Listen Out's Melbourne Stent.
12:33The entire incident was captured on video, where Banks can be seen throwing her mic and
12:38storming off after the item lands on stage.
12:41She kind of apologized the next day in a since-deleted post on social media, but she didn't exactly
12:46display remorse.
12:47As she put it,
12:48"'The can definitely didn't hit me, and I definitely still got paid.
12:52More press, please, and thank you.'"
12:54Banks' wish was granted two years later when she finally completed a set at Splendour in
12:58the Grass, though she later called Aussie audiences
13:01"'terrible crowds' who were violent and belligerent."
13:05Fiona Apple once told Rolling Stone,
13:07"'When I have something to say, I'll say it.'"
13:09That attitude was plenty clear during a Louis Vuitton party in Tokyo in 2013.
13:14The event was celebrating the fashion staple's latest exhibition, entitled Timeless Muses.
13:20The music there essentially amounted to background noise, but that didn't sit well with Apple,
13:24who quickly grew frustrated with the audience's chatter.
13:27It probably didn't help that the noise was likely bouncing back and forth against the
13:31walls of the night's venue, the glamorous but high-ceilinged Tokyo Station Hotel.
13:36Apple reportedly at one point stood atop her piano and asked the audience to quiet down.
13:40She then struck a metal bell in an attempt to quiet them further.
13:44Other notable moments included hitting her head on her microphone, staring into the eyes
13:48of her guitarist, and backbending over the piano bench.
13:52None of this worked to shush the partygoers, so the chaos continued when Apple began cursing
13:57at the crowd.
13:58She angrily exited the stage shortly after, shortening her already compressed set.
14:03During a night themed around Timeless Muses, Apple certainly provided something that everyone
14:07there was unlikely to ever forget.
14:10Everyone loves deciphering a good mystery, but they don't usually come in the form of
14:14a rock concert ending abruptly.
14:16In 2012, however, there was a case of Jack White walking off less than an hour into a
14:20concert at Radio City Music Hall.
14:23There were numerous leads about why he left the stage, including a rowdy fan in the front
14:28row, ticket scalpers, and the fact that he reportedly wasn't happy with the sound.
14:32White himself at one point implied that it was about the energy of the audience, as he
14:36reportedly said,
14:37"'Jesus Christ.
14:38Is this an NPR convention?'
14:39"'I hear it goes down at NPR conventions.'"
14:43Months later, White told Rolling Stone,
14:45"'The crowd's in complete control of me.
14:47I was just doing what they told me to do.'"
14:50Whatever the reason was, it didn't stop fans from responding in kind.
14:54After aimlessly waiting for the show's encore and even starting their own Seven Nation Army
14:58sing-along, the crowd mobbed the stage door to confront White.
15:02They even scolded him, with statements like,
15:04"'Jack White kills puppies,' all the while banging on parked cars to get his attention."
15:09When a pizza delivery man arrived, bands were even more upset, eventually taking to social
15:13media to start the hashtag JackWhiteDebacle.
15:17By the time he played a killer full show the next day, though, most of the outrage
15:21had effectively died down.
15:23The practice of throwing food in protest dates back centuries, and in 2013, someone was more
15:29than happy to keep the tradition going at a Lupe Fiasco concert.
15:32The rapper lived up to his last name while performing at Salt Lake City's The Depot,
15:37where a fan in the balcony hit him with a tomato.
15:39The moment was captured on video that was posted to YouTube.
15:42Fiasco stopped the show after he was hit and then announced if there was anyone else like
15:47that, then they needed to leave.
15:48He then proceeded to nastily insult the supposed culprit.
15:52Furthermore, Fiasco requested that the entire balcony be cleared to weed out the perpetrator,
15:57and security obliged.
15:58However, some rowdy fans in the section didn't want to evacuate.
16:02By the time that security had gotten their way, Fiasco had grown impatient and left the
16:06stage.
16:07It wasn't until the crew began breaking down the equipment that fans took the hint.
16:11For a man who got big on claiming that the show goes on, he certainly let this show go
16:15off the rails.
16:16What makes this story even odder is that, according to management, nothing at The Depot
16:20is served with tomatoes, which all begs the question, who exactly was bringing their own
16:25tomatoes to a rap concert in 2013?