Punk Concert At A Comic Con Shut Down By Police, Moshers Arrested
Stereogum- Every year, Jacksonville hosts a pop culture convention called Collective Con, which celebrates music, anime, cosplay, comic books, and more. On Friday night, Joyce Manor played the event until their set was shut down due to moshing and crowdsurfing.
The show was originally supposed to transpire at Underbelly before being moved to The Prime F. Osborn III Convention Center. The Torrance band was performing with local punk bands Glazed and Porch Coffin. On X, fans say cops rushed into the Joyce Manor pit shortly after their set began. At one point, someone who worked at the venue went onstage to say, “No one going up in the air. Just take it easier,” and fans booed him.
As Joyce Manor attempted to play “Constant Headache,” a security guard stood onstage to stop crowdsurfers and stagedivers. Not long after, Joyce Manor announced that the show was shut down by the fire marshall. Cops detained concertgoers, and one video depicts police officers holding a handcuffed person to the floor. One fan was reportedly arrested.
Wild story outta the punk scene this weekend: a Joyce Manor show at a Jacksonville Pop Culture Convention was shut down after *checks notes* concertgoers started moshing and crowdsurfing - AKA after the crowd at the Joyce Manor show started acting like a crowd at a Joyce Manor show. Some people were even detained and arrested! For moshing!
I shockingly wasn't there myself, but I can't even imagine the moshing was all that extreme (no disrespect to Joyce Manor meant by that). There's some hardcore shows happening nowadays with the craziest shit I've ever seen happening, and I could be wrong, but I doubt they were getting down like this at the Jacksonville Anime Convention....
Getting arrested for moshing at a punk rock show is about as cool as an arrest could get in my mind, though, so it ain't all bad - but having it happen at a Comic Con definitely brings it down a bit.
I don't know why Joyce Manor were even booked at a convention center in the first place, but according to this Reddit user who was actually there, it was simply a last minute venue change that should've never happened….
shouldn’t have ever moved the venue. convention center clearly didn’t research before agreeing to move the show to their building. had who is assuming was an event organizer come on stage 5 mins into the set and tell everyone to stop moshing/crowd surfing so we could “have a safe show” to which people booed and cursed him off stage. few mins later they planted a security guard in the middle of the stage to throw people off if they got on stage to dive/crowd surf. ended up forcefully escorting a few off stage. minutes later the band announced the fire marshall was shutting the show down. i left pretty soon after that because i could tell it was gonna be bad news if i hung around, but my friends and i walked outside to what had to be at LEAST 10-13 cop cars lit up. that’s when the arrests started happening and a whole army attacking a bunch of kids who did nothing wrong. imagine going to see your favorite band and walking out in cuffs for having a good time. the osborn center encouraged police brutality tonight (also the only arrests i saw were people of color, no surprise there. holds up for jacksonville police.) and called law enforcement for NOTHING. huge shame on them for being so unprepared, impatient and judgmental. kinda scared what the outcome was for JM. wonder if they got in trouble.
Is it bad that after seeing this story my first instinct is to see if Pup Punk could play a Comic Con this Summer? Having a couple arrests take place at one of our concerts would do wonders for our reputation in the streets. I mean - it's worth a shot, right?
If you haven't heard of Joyce Manor before, here's a little sampling of their music….