You might have already heard about the horror show that happened down the road from Coachella last week in Indio, California. Revolve Festival, formally known as the event to be seen at pre and post Coachella itself, descended into chaos as influencers were allegedly left waiting in the desert for up to five hours for a bus, with some scaling metal fences and ‘pushing, shoving and shouting’ to get on a shuttle quicker.
In an outburst of gorgeous hyperbole, some attendees even compared the disorder to the ‘Hunger Games’ while others opted for ‘Fyre Festival 2.0’.
During the initial outburst of fury from attendees at being treated as far from A-list, many influencers took to TikTok to show their fans the chaos of the event. But, while Revolve are yet to make a statement themselves, other content creators are now taking to the platform to let the world know that isn’t quite how things went down.
‘I don’t work with Revolve’ influencer Tara Lynn told her followers on TikTok to avoid being accused of endorsement. ‘On the first day of the festival, I didn’t have the rabid experience that a lot of people got,’ she said before explaining she waited 45 minutes in a single file line to get on a coach—a universal and expected experience for anyone whose been to a UK festival.
Addressing the online accusations that some well-known influencers were acting with superiority to skip the queue, Tara said: ‘Everyone was being very respectful - we got on the bus - it wasn’t a whose dick is bigger contest… I had a great time on the first day.’
On the second day Tara arrived slightly later and there was ‘no f*cking line and it literally took us two minutes to get on the bus’. It was only in the evening after the music ended that the trouble started: ‘We left halfway through Jack Harlow because I didn’t want to wait in line for a shuttle,’ Tara explained. Then, when Jack Harlow was finished everyone just mobbed—there were six buses waiting and there was a line, and everyone just started running and trying to get on.
‘It was a f*_king sh_t show,’ she continued. ‘But that’s not Revolve’s fault. Like, there were mad security guards and lots of buses.’
Tara explained staff were telling influencers to ‘stay on the sidewalk’ and to ‘get in line’ but ‘no one was listening’ so, it was the people attending – not the negligence of the brand – that were responsible for making the event unsafe. ‘I felt more tight in a crowd trying to get on a shuttle than I did at Coachella—but that’s not Revolve’s fault,’ she reiterated.
Influencers at Revolve Festival aren’t the first or last people to ignore crowd control. But the scandal really seems to stem from the way the event was later portrayed online by those who attended and witnessed the mobs: ‘The second one person started running towards the buses everyone whipped out their phone because they wanted views on TikTok,’ Tara explained. ‘They saw all the videos from the day before were going viral, so they were like “omg Revolve sucks. Would you look at this!”. They just want views.’
A Revolve spokesperson told Grazia of the chaos: 'As the festival was reaching capacity late Saturday afternoon, shuttle access to the venue was limited in order to remain in compliance with safety requirements causing longer wait times for entry and resulting in some guests not being able to attend the festival. The safety of our guests is of the utmost importance to us and we will always make that a priority.
'We sincerely apologise to all the guests who were impacted. We always strive to provide a great experience and we promise to do better.'
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