One of the UK’s biggest electronic festivals was shut down last night due to chaotic scenes at its venue in the London docklands.
Bloc 2012 – which was going to be headlined by Snoop Dogg and Orbital – was being held in a new venue in London Pleasure Gardens at Royal Victoria Docks, and had been designed by the team behind Glastonbury’s Shangri-La.
The Guardian reported many ticket holders were prevented from entering the festival site after queuing for hours, while extra police made their way to the location before midnight to oversee the departure of those inside.
Angry punters took to Twitter to vent their frustration after paying £55 to £125 to access the sell-out event. Pictures were posted of festivalgoers standing behind crowd barriers with police looking on – while the #bloc hashtag started trending big time in the UK.
Music writer Dan Hancox reported shortly after midnight that the police had “cut the site in two”, tweeting earlier: “Bloc is um a disaster right now. We’re in the middle of a car crash.”
The reaction of another Twitter user, Rob Gregg, was very blunt: “Bloc is the worst festival I’ve ever been to. I don’t know how they’ve managed it.”
