Speaker 1: Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. This is the
Speaker 1: story about a music festival, and not just any music festival,
Speaker 1: a disastrous music festival led by one of the biggest
Speaker 1: musical stars in the world, Travis Scott. But this is
Speaker 1: also a story about well hell and one of the
Speaker 1: dirtiest of the seven Deadly sins, greed. And this is
Speaker 1: also a story about the devil and what happens when
Speaker 1: the devil is in control. It's the story of a
Speaker 1: supposed Satanic sacrifice, an energy harvest wherein innocent souls were stolen.
Speaker 1: This is a story about Travis Scott's Astor World, a
Speaker 1: festival that contained some great music. Unlike that music I
Speaker 1: played for you at the top of the show. That
Speaker 1: wasn't great music. That was a preset loop from my
Speaker 1: melotron called Barbarian Bolero MK One. I played you that
Speaker 1: loop because I can't afford the rights to Easy on
Speaker 1: Me by Adele And why would I play you that
Speaker 1: specific slice of redemptive torch Cheese? Could I afford it?
Speaker 1: Because that was the number one song in America on
Speaker 1: November fifth, twenty twenty one, and that was the day
Speaker 1: that a music festival organized by a hometown hero in
Speaker 1: Houston went horribly awry, plunging tens of thousands into what
Speaker 1: truly felt like hell on Earth on this episode, greed,
Speaker 1: satanic sacrifices, snatched souls. In Travis Scott's Astro World, I'm
Speaker 1: Jake Brennan, and this this disgraceland hell. That was a
Speaker 1: word used to describe the COVID nineteen pandemic, especially by
Speaker 1: frontline workers who witness the worst of the infectious disease
Speaker 1: at close range. Here in the US. In January of
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, just about a year after the first
Speaker 1: case was recorded in Washington State, cases suddenly surged nationwide.
Speaker 1: And it's not difficult to understand why social distancing mass
Speaker 1: is that type of behavior. It's not normal those restrictions.
Speaker 1: Human beings aren't supposed to live with them. We require contact, interaction.
Speaker 1: We need to be around other people, whether it's at
Speaker 1: the movie theater or a concert venue, or a church
Speaker 1: or a ballpark. Shared experiences are crucial to the human experience.
Speaker 1: Coming out of COVID, what we wanted more than anything
Speaker 1: was to have those experiences again, to get our lives back,
Speaker 1: to feel that sense of normalcy. A sense of ourselves
Speaker 1: in social settings with other people, but we had to
Speaker 1: relearn it. Months a year spent in isolation meant we
Speaker 1: were collectively rusty. So we conjured a spell, one we
Speaker 1: hoped would heal the pain of COVID, but instead we
Speaker 1: created a monster, a malevolent entity with a mind of
Speaker 1: its own. And for those unlucky enough to get in
Speaker 1: the path of this monster, they found themselves staring down
Speaker 1: the very thing we all thought we'd escaped from hell.
Speaker 1: November fifth, twenty twenty one, Houston, Texas, nine am. The
Speaker 1: crowd outside Energy Park was growing restless. Some fans have
Speaker 1: been there long before sunrise, but the gates wouldn't open
Speaker 1: for another hour, so they were forced to wait. But
Speaker 1: what they really wanted was to be letting out all
Speaker 1: that emotion and aggression that they'd started up during the
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen pandemic in isolation. They wanted to rage. Check
Speaker 1: that they were under a directive to rage, per the
Speaker 1: organizer and headliner of the third annual Astroworld Festival, the
Speaker 1: hip hop artist Travis Scott. Raging was Travis Scott's ethos,
Speaker 1: the kind shared by a hardcore or a punk audience
Speaker 1: or Travis's beloved world of professional wrestling. A Travis Scott
Speaker 1: show implied physical audience participation, mosh pits, crowdsurfing, stage rushing,
Speaker 1: and While part of the allure of Astorworld was the
Speaker 1: eclectic two day lineup with performances by Bad Bunny Dam
Speaker 1: and Paula Sizza, then Earth Went and Fired and name
Speaker 1: a few, Travis Scott was different. He was a hometown boy,
Speaker 1: made good and all that. Two solo albums that debuted
Speaker 1: at the top of the Billboard Album chart, Birds in
Speaker 1: the Traps Sing good Night, and Astorworld, the latter named
Speaker 1: after the former six Flags amusement park in Houston that
Speaker 1: once stood near the music festival's location. A compilation album
Speaker 1: called jack Boys also number one number one singles too,
Speaker 1: and don't forget the merchandise collaborations with Hot Wheels, with Nike,
Speaker 1: with Receis, and most famously with McDonald's, who just one
Speaker 1: year prior had made Travis the first celebrity to be
Speaker 1: featured on their menu since Michael Jordan way back in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety two. My point is Travis Scott in November
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty one was huge, but back home in Houston,
Speaker 1: Travis Scott was beyond huge. He loomed large, just like
Speaker 1: that giant statue of him now loomed over the growing
Speaker 1: crowd of hundreds, impatiently waiting for the gates to open
Speaker 1: and let them into Energy Park and into the Astro
Speaker 1: World Festival. Once inside, their eyes would be open to
Speaker 1: a whole new universe, or so promised the promotional posters.
Speaker 1: See you on the other side, the poster read, next
Speaker 1: to a sketch of a pair of hands with big
Speaker 1: eyes stuck in their palms, and what looked to be
Speaker 1: a two lane road descending down a large tunnel. Above
Speaker 1: that tunnel was a crude drawing of a figure walking
Speaker 1: through a doorframe. A whole new universe the other side.
Speaker 1: Here tonight, the crowd that was assembled outside the gates
Speaker 1: understood the assignment at hand. To get to that other side,
Speaker 1: they had to push the party to the edge of
Speaker 1: total chaos. Only then would the experience be truly transformative.
Speaker 1: The crowd had done this in twenty fifteen at Lallapalooza
Speaker 1: in Chicago, when Travis Scott encouraged fans to jump the
Speaker 1: barricades to give any and all security guards the finger
Speaker 1: and a chant we want rage. Travis got the boot
Speaker 1: just five minutes into his set, but not before a
Speaker 1: fifteen year old girl was injured in the resulting stampede,
Speaker 1: for which Travis Scott was charged with reckless conduct and
Speaker 1: sentenced to one year of court supervision. Two years later,
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen, Travis was charged with disorderly conduct in
Speaker 1: order to pay restitution to multiple people who were injured
Speaker 1: when he once again instructed fans to rush the stage
Speaker 1: during a show in Arkansas. In just weeks after that,
Speaker 1: at a show of Manhattan, Travis Scott, on stage at
Speaker 1: Terminal five, looked up at a fan dangling from the
Speaker 1: second floor ballot be about to fall into the audience below.
Speaker 1: I see you, but are you going to do it?
Speaker 1: Travis asked from the stage. The kid hesitated, They're gonna
Speaker 1: catch you. Travis said, don't be scared. Don't be scared.
Speaker 1: The kid let go. It was dropped safely into the
Speaker 1: arms of his fellow concertgoers. Not so lucky was the
Speaker 1: next ban to fall from the same balcony, who did
Speaker 1: so not under his own volition, but because he was
Speaker 1: pushed as the crowd surged against his back. He tumbled
Speaker 1: over the edge, falling fast, hitting the floor with such
Speaker 1: force that he immediately broke several bones in his vertebrae
Speaker 1: and was paralyzed. Now, on November fifth, twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: at Astro World, those who had been injured and disabled
Speaker 1: at previous Travis Scott shows were a distant memory. COVID
Speaker 1: felt like a lifetime ago, a really bad dream that
Speaker 1: everyone had since woken up from here. Now it was
Speaker 1: all about moving forward, onwards and upwards in the past
Speaker 1: year and through these gar and so even before the
Speaker 1: gates officially opened at ten am, that's what many were doing,
Speaker 1: crawling under fences, knocking over barricades, snapping the chain link
Speaker 1: fences with bowl cutters, even those who weren't supposed to
Speaker 1: be there, Literally thousands more showing up beyond the fifty
Speaker 1: thousand ticketed attendees. And when the gates did open for real,
Speaker 1: it was like a swollen river bursting a dam. No order,
Speaker 1: no chill, just a swarm of bodies, mostly teenagers and
Speaker 1: young adults, feet pounding the pavement, some pushed, some pulled,
Speaker 1: some falling to the ground, trampled, entire sections of fencing flattened,
Speaker 1: They skipped security checkpoints, knocked over metal detectors. The first
Speaker 1: set by the first artist of the day wasn't for
Speaker 1: another three hours, but none of that mattered. Time right
Speaker 1: now moved just as unpredictably as it had during the pandemic.
Speaker 1: But you you're moving with purpose. You're trying to get
Speaker 1: safely past the crush at the gate and get inside,
Speaker 1: which you do, and the first point of interest you
Speaker 1: encounter is the merch booth. Hundreds, if not thousands, of
Speaker 1: bodies are running straight forward. The barricade set up to
Speaker 1: maintain an organized line of commerce are being ignored. Kids
Speaker 1: are jumping them or just pushing them aside, cutting the
Speaker 1: line if there was even a line to cut. The
Speaker 1: crowd grows, the bodies push forward. You're caught in the
Speaker 1: flow against your will, so you find a way out
Speaker 1: and take it, And just at that moment, the crowd
Speaker 1: gets really crazy. Kids, adults, normal human beings suddenly gone feral.
Speaker 1: They want what they want and they're going to take it.
Speaker 1: As you walk away, you watch as people start to
Speaker 1: pounce on the merch counter, grabbing t shirts, grabbing for
Speaker 1: registers full of cash, whatever they can get their hands on.
Speaker 1: Minutes later, you hear some dude telling his girl that
Speaker 1: the merch area was shut down after multiple requests for
Speaker 1: police and medical attention. By this point, you've made your
Speaker 1: way through the giant whitehead statue of Travis Scott that
Speaker 1: leads into the main concert area. It's the same bust
Speaker 1: of Travis on the cover of his Astra World album.
Speaker 1: You walk straight through his open mouth, which is kind
Speaker 1: of rad but also kind of gross at the same time,
Speaker 1: and then right up ahead you see it just like
Speaker 1: it was shown to you on the Astra World posters,
Speaker 1: that long road descending into a large tunnel. But this
Speaker 1: road is actually a stage which looks not unlike an
Speaker 1: inverted cross, And the large tunnel that this inverted cross
Speaker 1: sprawls into is actually a circle constructed in layers to
Speaker 1: create depth. That circle is drilled into an even bigger backdrop,
Speaker 1: which is shaped like a mountain. Right now, the mountain
Speaker 1: is black with a tan outline, nondescript, just another man
Speaker 1: made structure in broad daylight. But tonight, at nine pm,
Speaker 1: to be exact, it will change. Everything will change because
Speaker 1: that's when Travis Scott will take the stage. That's when
Speaker 1: that nondescript man made structure will become possessed. That's when
Speaker 1: the monster will take over, and you and every other
Speaker 1: person here willingly or not, will be taken kicking and
Speaker 1: screaming to the other side. By eight point thirty that evening,
Speaker 1: the mountain backdrop on the Astor World stage was glowing yellow,
Speaker 1: then orange, and then red. The audience was well beyond capacity.
Speaker 1: Remember that's fifty thousand people due to all the gay
Speaker 1: crashers who overwhelmed Astor World's infrastructure. The incredibly bright colors
Speaker 1: radiating from the stage cut through the dark Houston night,
Speaker 1: bleeding all over the fences staring back, and the layered
Speaker 1: circles at the center of the mountain began to glow
Speaker 1: red too. Then the words Sea on the other side
Speaker 1: were followed by a timer. It started at thirty minutes
Speaker 1: and immediately began to count down. Fans had spent the
Speaker 1: last seven plus hours watching sets by Master p by
Speaker 1: Don Tolliver, by Little Baby, and others, but they were
Speaker 1: beyond sight for their hometown hero. Each minute that the
Speaker 1: timer counted down was a minute closer to Travis Scott,
Speaker 1: closer to Rage, closer to that other side. Twenty five minutes,
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen, Around the ten minute mark in the front
Speaker 1: left quadrant up near the stage. A huge surge in
Speaker 1: the crowd came from It was violent and quick, and
Speaker 1: there was no choice but to be carried along. People
Speaker 1: were packed in so tight that you either had your
Speaker 1: arms straight up in the air or straight down by
Speaker 1: your side. It was like you looked directly into the
Speaker 1: eyes of Medusa, turned to stone with a snap, arms
Speaker 1: pressed against your chest, fists clenched into your neck, your
Speaker 1: head leaning back, face angled up to the open sky,
Speaker 1: gasping for a few tiny breaths above the fray. The
Speaker 1: air of anticipation and excitement so often present at the
Speaker 1: start of a show like this, suddenly blotted out by
Speaker 1: a feeling of dread. Someone screamed, and then another. War
Speaker 1: cries and sounds of warning. The blood red light from
Speaker 1: the stage intensified. Five minutes four three, two one. An
Speaker 1: organ rang out, started low and then building ancient history
Speaker 1: reanimated but still rotten. The layered circles in the center
Speaker 1: of the mountain on stage began to glow deep red.
Speaker 1: The monster was alive, now taking shape. It sent forth
Speaker 1: a messenger to announce its arrival. An image of a
Speaker 1: bird or a dragon was flapping its wings in a
Speaker 1: cloud of fire at the top of the mountain, and
Speaker 1: the organ music became auto tuned inverted, just like that
Speaker 1: cross of a stage. Without warning, Travis Scott jumped from
Speaker 1: out of nowhere, his feet landing hard, the music hitting
Speaker 1: even harder, bass, treble, organ fire, huge flame shot into
Speaker 1: the sky all around him. Travis's first song was called
Speaker 1: escape plan ironic, seeing as there was no escape as
Speaker 1: the crowd once again surged forward. This time the surge
Speaker 1: was harder and more forceful than before. Body sandwiched into
Speaker 1: other bodies, so tight that you could feel your lungs
Speaker 1: compressed and the air lead out of you. Ever been
Speaker 1: in a crowd crushed before, you know how frightening It
Speaker 1: is not just the realization that your oxygen supply has
Speaker 1: been cut out, or of the adrenaline and the survival
Speaker 1: instinct that kicks in to save you, but the feeling
Speaker 1: that you've completely lost control. Thousands of bodies all becoming one,
Speaker 1: moving as one, ebbing and flowing as one. Your feet
Speaker 1: literally lift off the ground, you removed from one spot
Speaker 1: to another. It's like you're being carried away on a
Speaker 1: gigantic wave in the ocean, only the ocean is other people,
Speaker 1: just like Hell is, other people that make no mistake,
Speaker 1: Hell was here on Earth, at astor world. The monster's
Speaker 1: voice was in the base frequencies, so loud that it
Speaker 1: felt like the ground was about to split open and
Speaker 1: swallow everyone whole. The monster's tongue was in the flames
Speaker 1: that continued to erupt all over the stage. Darkness devoured
Speaker 1: the light. The mountain was a volcano. The center of
Speaker 1: the layered circle morphed into a giant eyeball, darting to
Speaker 1: the left and then to the right, looking at all
Speaker 1: fifty thousand plus people out there, looking directly at you,
Speaker 1: all seeing, all knowing. The crowd crush swelled again as
Speaker 1: the inverted church music mixed with an ear splitting hip
Speaker 1: hop beat, and the intended effect was one release in catharsis,
Speaker 1: But in reality, the effect it created was one of
Speaker 1: pure panic. Some couldn't handle it. They crouched down on
Speaker 1: one knee, attempting to catch their breath. Instead, they were
Speaker 1: plowed over by the bodies surrounding them, knocked to the ground,
Speaker 1: stepped on trampled mash pits, were collapsing in on themselves,
Speaker 1: broken feet, broken hands, dislocated shoulders, blood running from the noses,
Speaker 1: and blood pouring out of mouths, eyes rolling into the
Speaker 1: backs of heads, blue lips, gray skin. A college student
Speaker 1: displayed out on the ground, unconscious, maybe dead. Someone started
Speaker 1: CPR on her while others screened for a medic. A
Speaker 1: nine year old on top of his father's shoulders, thrown
Speaker 1: forward when his dad was caught up and the crowd crush,
Speaker 1: the boy was launched into a massive arms and legs.
Speaker 1: One second he was right there and the next he
Speaker 1: was gone. Things were going very, very badly, but not
Speaker 1: everyone knew it. If you watch videos taken by those
Speaker 1: in the crowd, you can hear people screaming help and
Speaker 1: stop the show in between the songs. The footage is chilling.
Speaker 1: You can see people climbing up on risers to get
Speaker 1: the attention of camera operators, yelling to them that the
Speaker 1: show had to be stopped, that people were dying. But
Speaker 1: you can also hear other fans making fun of the whistleblowers,
Speaker 1: telling them to calm down. The crowd was just too big.
Speaker 1: The music, the lights, the pyro, all of it was
Speaker 1: waging a constant, all out assault on the senses on stage.
Speaker 1: Travis Scott was hoisted in the air on a riser
Speaker 1: of his own. He looked down on the mass of
Speaker 1: flesh watched one kid escape the crowd and climb up
Speaker 1: one of the trees there on site. It was like
Speaker 1: the guy hanging from the balcony in Manhattan all over again.
Speaker 1: Taking his cue from the kid in the tree, Travis asked,
Speaker 1: who wants to rage. Some of the crowd roared their approval,
Speaker 1: while others went horace, calling for medical attention. Voices of
Speaker 1: terror mixed in with voices of rapture, no telling the
Speaker 1: two apart. But then, for a brief moment it seemed
Speaker 1: like things would turn around. Travis noticed an ambulance pushing
Speaker 1: its way through the audience en route to someone who
Speaker 1: was passed out and needed medical attention. He stopped the show.
Speaker 1: He watched silently as the fan was helped. The smartphone
Speaker 1: video of this moment shows actual concern in Travis Scott's face,
Speaker 1: but also confusion, almost like he's stuck in a moment,
Speaker 1: as if he went somewhere else slowly, though he came
Speaker 1: back thirty seconds later. He asked everyone who was okay
Speaker 1: to stick a middle finger in the sky, and the
Speaker 1: fingers went up, and then just sixty seconds after he
Speaker 1: stopped the show, it was back on. The music blasted,
Speaker 1: the flames erupted, the ambulance slowly made its way out
Speaker 1: while Travis was screaming, I want to make this motherfucking
Speaker 1: ground shake. God damn it. He was the quote unquote
Speaker 1: maestro directing the chaos, as The Washington Post once wrote
Speaker 1: about him, exhibiting that trademark unhinged leaping, as Rolling Stone
Speaker 1: magazine put it when they compared Travis Scott's frantic stage
Speaker 1: presence to Michael Jackson's iconic Moonwalk. But Travis Scott didn't
Speaker 1: do Moonwalk's. He didn't glide on the ground. He shook it.
Speaker 1: At nine thirty eight pm, a little over a half
Speaker 1: hour into Travis scott set, the Houston Fire Department had
Speaker 1: seen enough, way too many calls for people being trampled,
Speaker 1: passing out in need of CPR or another urgent medical attention.
Speaker 1: At that moment, Houston Fire officially declared Asterworld a mass
Speaker 1: casualty event. Houston PD informed the festival's promoters that the
Speaker 1: show had to end right now, but the show didn't end.
Speaker 1: The monster wasn't ready to go back in its box.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back after this. We're We're where ten pm,
Speaker 1: twenty two minutes after the Houston Fire Department declared Astorworld
Speaker 1: a mass casualty event, Travis Scott continued to perform, and
Speaker 1: he was doing so now with a surprise guests, the
Speaker 1: Toronto rapper and singer Drake, who joined Travis on stage
Speaker 1: to euphoric applause from the crowd below. Meanwhile, in that
Speaker 1: same crowd, medics made a desperate search for those who
Speaker 1: needed help. The cries of the wounded and the dying
Speaker 1: rang out, only to be drowned out by the throng.
Speaker 1: Bodies were being hauled over barricades and passed over her
Speaker 1: shoulders as if they were crowdsurfing, But these bodies were limped,
Speaker 1: and in many cases the medics on hand were ill equipped,
Speaker 1: no defibrillators, no oxygen, just to their bare hands. One
Speaker 1: medic did have a backboard to transport an unconscious woman,
Speaker 1: but the backboard had no straps. It was a struggle
Speaker 1: to carry the body through the crowd of people, and
Speaker 1: many didn't move aside. Others were oblivious. Two caught up
Speaker 1: in the sight and sound of Drake and Travis on stage,
Speaker 1: the medics lost their grip and the unconscious woman began
Speaker 1: to slide out of the backboard with no straps. She
Speaker 1: hit the ground directly on her head. Elsewhere, another ambulance
Speaker 1: made of a labored slog through thousands of people. A
Speaker 1: couple of fans jumped on top of the vehicle and
Speaker 1: began to dance on it. One concert goer later compared
Speaker 1: the sight of people trapped to the crowd the pigs
Speaker 1: in a cage. Others said they were literally in hell.
Speaker 1: At ten fourteen pm, fourteen minutes after Drake's arrival and
Speaker 1: now over half an hour since the mass casualty event declaration,
Speaker 1: Travis Scott finished the last song of the night. Pastor
Speaker 1: World was officially over, just one minute after a twenty
Speaker 1: three year old attendee, the festival's first fatality, died at
Speaker 1: a nearby hospital. Ten people in total died from injuries
Speaker 1: sustained at Astorworld that night, all of them in their
Speaker 1: teens or twenties, with the exception of a nine year
Speaker 1: old boy. I told you about him earlier. Ezra Blunt
Speaker 1: fell off his father's shoulders when the crowd surge hit
Speaker 1: them from behind. His father could not find him, and
Speaker 1: did not find him until much later, when Ezra turned
Speaker 1: up as a John Doe at the hospital. He was
Speaker 1: put into a medically induced coma and died shortly thereafter.
Speaker 1: The News of the Astor World tragedy quickly hit the wires.
Speaker 1: The next morning, Travis Scott issued a statement that read,
Speaker 1: in part, I'm absolutely devastated by what took place last night.
Speaker 1: My prayers go out to the families and all those
Speaker 1: impacted by what happened at astra World festival. On TikTok, Instagram,
Speaker 1: and Facebook, survivors posted videos they had taken during the
Speaker 1: show that clearly documented the harrowing sequence of events. With
Speaker 1: those videos came not just outrage and shock from other
Speaker 1: users online, but some extremely disturbing interpretations of what was
Speaker 1: really going on or so some were saying. The search
Speaker 1: term Astoral World sacrifice began to trend on TikTok. The
Speaker 1: so called interpretations followed Astor World was a Satanic ritual,
Speaker 1: astra a World was a quote unquote energy harvest in
Speaker 1: which Travis Scott put people under a spell and snatched
Speaker 1: their souls. Just look at the demonic imagery, the flames,
Speaker 1: the giant I stage that looked like an inverted cross,
Speaker 1: the shirt Travis was wearing with cartoon figures walking through
Speaker 1: a portal and emerging with what seemed to be horns
Speaker 1: on their head. And this is the sampling of what
Speaker 1: people were writing on TikTok and Twitter and elsewhere. If
Speaker 1: you don't believe that there was nothing demonic about the
Speaker 1: whole concert, you are spiritually blind. And I pray that
Speaker 1: God opens your eyes. I'm a big fan of Travis Scott,
Speaker 1: but this is some demonic ass shit in this one,
Speaker 1: which referred to the fact that Astor World attendees were
Speaker 1: required to have proof of a negative COVID test or
Speaker 1: a COVID vaccination quote jab plus five g in frequency
Speaker 1: at concert equal dead unquote, just to reiterate the imagery
Speaker 1: and the video in the first hand accounts coming out
Speaker 1: of Astor World were so fucked up that people were
Speaker 1: saying jab plus five g and frequency at concert equal dead.
Speaker 1: In other words, that this was some mass conspiracy involving
Speaker 1: the government and the music industry to kill people at
Speaker 1: a Travis Scott show. Coming out of the COVID pandemic
Speaker 1: didn't bring us together, it started to pull us even
Speaker 1: further apart. Consider this. The very next day, November sixth,
Speaker 1: Troy Finner, Houston's chief of Police, held a press conference,
Speaker 1: a portion of which was spent addressing these wild rumors
Speaker 1: that were circulating online. He reminded people to be respectful
Speaker 1: of the families of those who had been killed and
Speaker 1: to follow the facts and the evidence. He said there
Speaker 1: were a lot of narratives out there, including one in
Speaker 1: which Astorworld had been a targeted attack by an individual
Speaker 1: who was running around and injecting people with drugs. TMZ
Speaker 1: was one of the news outlets peddling this narrative, saying
Speaker 1: a source connected to Astorworld told him that the crowd
Speaker 1: crush was due to the panic that ensued when we're
Speaker 1: got around that some crazy person was stabbing people with
Speaker 1: a needle and shooting them up. At the press conference,
Speaker 1: Houston's chief of Police did not shut down this particular story. Instead,
Speaker 1: Chief Troy Finner went on to essentially confirm this story.
Speaker 1: He said that, according to medical staff, one of Astor
Speaker 1: World security guards was reaching over to restrain someone in
Speaker 1: the crowd when he felt a prick in his neck.
Speaker 1: Immediately he went unconscious. He needed to be revived with narcan, which,
Speaker 1: as you probably know, is used to treat narcotic overdoses,
Speaker 1: and the medical staff that examined him confirmed that there
Speaker 1: was a mark on his neck consistent with a needle prick.
Speaker 1: So here you have the top ranking official in Houston's
Speaker 1: police force seemingly confirming one of the wild rumors floating
Speaker 1: around online and in the press, which in turn caused
Speaker 1: even more panic and even more confusion. Panic and confusion
Speaker 1: two things now keeping the monster of Astor World alive.
Speaker 1: Novem twenty twenty one, five days after the tragedy at
Speaker 1: Astorworld and four days since Houston's chief of Police spoke
Speaker 1: about a festival security guard getting pricked in the neck
Speaker 1: with a needle, Chief Troy Finner, was now giving another
Speaker 1: press conference, this one in which he walked back his
Speaker 1: statement from four days prior. During that time, he had
Speaker 1: spoken directly to the security guard in question, and what
Speaker 1: the guy had to say for himself was far less
Speaker 1: sinister than previously believed. Turns out, the security guard was
Speaker 1: not injected in the neck, but instead hitting the head
Speaker 1: and knocked unconscious. He woke up shortly afterward in the
Speaker 1: medical tent, and there was no needle and no narcan
Speaker 1: and no faceless, nameless demon running around the Astor World
Speaker 1: grounds shooting up unsuspecting attendees with drugs, which begs the
Speaker 1: question who provided this targeted attack narrative in the first place,
Speaker 1: Who is the quote source connected to astorworlde who provided
Speaker 1: TMZ with this information in the first place, information which
Speaker 1: TMZ had since taken down from its website. And speaking
Speaker 1: of questions, why didn't the show end at nine thirty
Speaker 1: eight pm that night when the Houston Fire Department declared
Speaker 1: it in a mass casualty event. When the Houston PD
Speaker 1: told the promoter to shut it down, why did Travis
Speaker 1: Scott keep performing for more than another thirty minutes? There
Speaker 1: were no clear answers offered to these questions. The cops,
Speaker 1: the promoters, the security, the County, Travis Scott, everyone involved
Speaker 1: passed the buck. The Houston PD said they didn't have
Speaker 1: the proper authority to shut the show down. Security guards
Speaker 1: spoke of poor training and worse communication. One Houston City
Speaker 1: Council member stressed that the event was technically not held
Speaker 1: on city properties, so you know, not their problem. Of course,
Speaker 1: no one wants to admit they played a part in
Speaker 1: creating a monster, especially one that takes the lives of
Speaker 1: ten people. But someone would be held accountable, and the
Speaker 1: families of victims were going to make sure of it.
Speaker 1: Two years later, in twenty twenty three, Travis Scott sat
Speaker 1: in a room in Houston where he was grilled for
Speaker 1: eight hours during a civil deposition. A Texas grand jury
Speaker 1: had declined to indict him on criminal charges, but three
Speaker 1: hundred and eighty seven lawsuits were brought against him, against
Speaker 1: Live Nation Entertainment and against various subcontractors. Three hundred and
Speaker 1: eighty seven lawsuits, representing nearly twenty eight hundred victims and
Speaker 1: totaling billions of dollars in damages, all rolled into a
Speaker 1: single legal action. These were in addition to the ten
Speaker 1: wrongful death lawsuits filed by families of the deceased. Travis
Speaker 1: Scott maintained his innocence. He said he didn't know how
Speaker 1: bad it was out there in the crowd, and he
Speaker 1: wouldn't know the extent of the carnage until the next morning.
Speaker 1: He did admit that someone spoke to him during his
Speaker 1: performance shortly before ten PM, right around the time that
Speaker 1: Drake joined him on State A voice that came through
Speaker 1: as in your monitors and said, you, Trav, you gotta
Speaker 1: wrap it up. It's getting got of hectic out there.
Speaker 1: Not people are getting crushed, stopped the show. Not people
Speaker 1: can't breathe, they're passing out, maybe dying. Just it's getting
Speaker 1: kind of hectic out there. And so Travis Scott wrapped
Speaker 1: it up. It just took him another fourteen minutes, give
Speaker 1: or take to do so. Attorneys representing the plaintiffs were skeptical.
Speaker 1: They couldn't prove if the voice coming through Travis's any
Speaker 1: your monitors had more explicit instructions. But there were other
Speaker 1: things that were hard to write off, like the fact
Speaker 1: that if Travis wanted to pocket an additional four point
Speaker 1: five million dollars coming to him from the concert's live stream,
Speaker 1: he had to finish his complete set as planned. In
Speaker 1: other words, ending early meant losing a massive payday. It
Speaker 1: sounds cynical, I know, but attorneys are paid to be cynical.
Speaker 1: So these attorneys filed in an emergency motion to obtain
Speaker 1: Travis Scott's phone records, the thinking being that by doing so,
Speaker 1: perhaps it could uncover some evidence to prove that he
Speaker 1: knew more than he was letting on. There was just
Speaker 1: one problem. There was no phone. Travis Scott's phone, his
Speaker 1: cell phone, the one he owned at the time of
Speaker 1: Astor World in twenty twenty one. It was gone, like
Speaker 1: long gone in just months after the festival. In January
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty two, while on a boat in the
Speaker 1: Gulf of Mexico, Travis Scott's cell phone fell into the
Speaker 1: water and sank all the way down into the murky
Speaker 1: depths below. But a phone wasn't all Travis Scott lost.
Speaker 1: In May of this year, twenty twenty four, it was
Speaker 1: reported by The Houston Chronicle that all ten lawsuits filed
Speaker 1: by the families of the ten Astor World victims had
Speaker 1: been settled, including the one on behalf of nine year
Speaker 1: old Ezra Blunt, Travis Live Nation, other companies and individuals.
Speaker 1: They settled those lawsuits for undisclosed sums and under confidential terms,
Speaker 1: in many cases just days before the suit were scheduled
Speaker 1: to go to trial. The news came mere months after
Speaker 1: the revelation that Astorworld organizers miscalculated a state fire code
Speaker 1: when planning the event. According to that fire code, each
Speaker 1: person at the show needed seven square feet to prevent overcrowding,
Speaker 1: so by that math, capacity should have been about thirty
Speaker 1: four five hundred people. Instead, the organizers mistakenly settled on
Speaker 1: five square feet per person, resulting in the fifty thousand
Speaker 1: fans that were ticketed. That's a difference of more than
Speaker 1: fifteen thousand people. Fifteen thousand extra people. That's no small detail.
Speaker 1: But the devil is in the details. That may be true,
Speaker 1: but for thousands of people on a warm Texas night
Speaker 1: in November, the devil was that Astorworld. Then that was
Speaker 1: a disgrace. I'm Jake Brennan in This is Disgrace slaand
Speaker 1: all right, guys, thanks for checking out this incredibly dark
Speaker 1: episode on Travis Scott. Before I get to the question
Speaker 1: of the week, I want to remind you guys, we're
Speaker 1: doing this live stream event. I want you to be
Speaker 1: a part of it. It's on October ninth. I'm me
Speaker 1: tell them a story of Blink one eighty two's Tom
Speaker 1: DeLong and his work with UFO disclosure. And there's a
Speaker 1: lot of creepy government cover up and conspiracy attached to this.
Speaker 1: Go to moment dot co slash Disgraceland to get your tickets.
Speaker 1: Sets for October ninth, You guys can be a part
Speaker 1: of the show with me. Thank you for checking out
Speaker 1: this episode on Travis Scott and ask World where ten
Speaker 1: people died ten So a question of the week for
Speaker 1: you guys is what is music's darkest day? Was it
Speaker 1: this disaster? Was it a plane crash, a riot, a
Speaker 1: murder spree, serial killing? What was? There is so much
Speaker 1: evil in the history of music that the choices here
Speaker 1: are kind of endless when you think about it. So
Speaker 1: let me know what day or event was the darkest
Speaker 1: for music history. Six one seven nine oh six six
Speaker 1: six three eight, Leave me a voicemail, send me a text,
Speaker 1: and let me know. You can also reach me at
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Speaker 1: and win some free merch. All right, here comes some credits.
Speaker 1: Disgraceland was created by Yours Truly and is produced in
Speaker 1: partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be
Speaker 1: found on the show notes page at disgracelampod dot com.
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Speaker 1: Don Man