SEATTLE, Wash. (GNR Fans Website) - In what's sure to be a legal quagmire, it sounds like Axl Rose wants the Vancouver, British Columbia, venue to foot the bill for the riot that ensued when
Thursday (Nov. 7)'s scheduled
Guns N' Roses tour kickoff show was cancelled.
"We were going to play a show and the plug got pulled on us," said Rose, in a rare interview with KISW Radio in Seattle Friday (Nov. 8) afternoon. "We were fully able to meet our commitments, and we don't really understand what happened. Basically the building manager just decided, and in our opinion prematurely, that the show was just canceled, and he didn't discuss it with anyone. He just announced it over the P.A." Rose added that he is having a legal team look into the situation.
Thousands of fans used metal barriers to smash widows and generally wreak havoc outside the venue when the show was called off, as an estimated 8,000 fans waited in line for the show's advertised 7:30 p.m. start. The hour-long riot brought 120 police officers into the area, resulting in 12 arrests and numerous minor injuries. Damages have been estimated in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
A statement issued by Harvey Jones, GM Place manager of operations, on Friday said: "A decision to cancel this show was made when it was recognized that the band could not take the stage at a reasonable time."
Later in a further statement to a local television station, he noted that Los Angeles to Vancouver was a two and a half hour flight and that Rose would still have had to go through customs. "Was he going to walk out of his limo on to the stage? I don't think so," said Jones.
Rose told KISW's Ditch that he was already in the air when the concert was called off by the venue. "It gets complicated," said Rose, "but the manager of the building said that the doors wouldn't open until he had confirmation that we were wheels up, that the plane was in the air, and as soon as he had that confirmation he canceled the show."
Insiders say the word that the date was cancelled came to the band just after 7 p.m. A schedule posted backstage on GNR's production office door listed a 9:45 p.m. start following sets from CKY and Mixmaster Mike.
Rose's chartered plane was subsequently diverted to Seattle. A band spokesperson told press the problem was bad weather while a promoter statement said it was due to mechanical difficulties with the plane.
Rose broke years of press silence in 1999 with a statement about his new band that closed with the South Park movie line, "Power to the people, peace out, and blame Canada."
