Twenty years ago today (June 30), nine Pearl Jam fans were crushed to death shortly after the band took the stage at the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. Members of the audience slipped on the muddy grounds in a chaotic urge to approach the front, and in the chaos they were inadvertently trampled by others.
The band had no idea what was going on until it was too late. They wrote the 2003 song “Love Boat Captain” to honor the victims. They also vowed never to play at another festival, but eventually reversed that decision when new security measures were implemented that would make another incident like Roskilde highly unlikely. The group has said many times over the years that it was the darkest moment in their history that continues to impact in a profound way.
Guitarist Stone Gossard, writing on behalf of the entire band, released a statement on the band’s website Tuesday to mark the solemn occasion:
20 years have passed since that day.
A normal show day at the festival … appears five hours ahead. Wait your place.
I hardly remember …
Sunny I think.
Lou Reed played, I think.
Then rain and wind.
But nothing has been the same since then.
An unexpected moment intervened that forever changed everyone involved.
The nine young men who were trampled. The lives of their families and loved ones who had to endure imagining their deaths over and over and the reality of never seeing them again. All the people at the festival who witnessed what was happening and tried to do something, maybe throwing someone or not being able …
And those, like our band, who never realized something was happening until it was too late …
All of us waiting forever for the news to be different.
Twenty years later, our band has 11 more children, all of them precious, and another 20 years among us …
Our understanding of the gravity and loss parents of these children feel has grown exponentially, magnified as we imagine our own children dying in circumstances like Roskilde 2000.
It is unthinkable, but there it is. Our worst nightmare.
Every day our hearts continue to ache and our stomachs turn at the thoughts of those dying young men and about what might have been different, if only … but nothing changes.
And our pain is a thousandth of that of families … moms and dads, sisters and brothers, best friends …
Our deepest condolences and apologies to the families who lost their children that day.
To the brothers and sisters, grandmothers, grandparents and friends, all those who lost their precious being …
They all failed to do what was needed in those hours before and in the days after the tragedy. The festival, the media, us included. We retired and became angry after many reports implied that PJ was responsible. Our words were not helpful at the time. We hid and hoped it wasn’t our fault. We have been doing our best to show ever since.
We have known some of the families over the years. With some, we have forged strong friendships … sharing and supporting each other. Some of us don’t know them.
Young men who loved PJ and wanted to get closer. That was the bottom line of everyone who passed that day. We hope we never know what that loss feels like. We wait.
We are always in the shadow of your pain and loss and we accept that shadow and we are always grateful to share that sacred space. The space created by the absence of those nine young people …
