M.I.A. Kicked Off Yet Another Stage: Audience Stampede Ends Her Big Chill Set

Time to update the ol' "Is M.I.A.'s 2010 Cursed?" chronology. After lightning and terrible sound cut short her HARD NYC set, and misunderstanding and tardiness torpedoed her record release show at P.S.1., M.I.A. found herself being politely asked to vacate a stage on which she was performing for the umpteenth time this year, as the crowd at Herefordshire's Big Chill Festival overran the stage during her set. To be fair, this time she'd invited the disturbance, asking for company in a spectacle that got overwhelming fast:

A spokesperson for the artist later "thanked the wonderful audience at the Big Chill for the fantastic reception and apologised for having to cut the set short due to overwhelming demand for fans to come on stage when only a few were expected."

And thus the pattern of M.I.A.'s 2010 continues: basically good intentions and a punk rock attitude collide with a bit of bad luck, and the catalog of non-musical stories about M.I.A. gains yet another entry. (Guilty, obviously.) Honestly, this looks fun; that she turns big festivals into anarchic basement shows is just one of the reasons we think she's much more knowing and deliberate than she gets credit for, especially lately. Even after all the criticism, she's not compromising. More artists should be this unpredictable.

MIA forced to cut short Big Chill Festival headline set due to stage invasion [NME]
M.I.A.'s Latest Botched Performance Totally Not Her Fault [NYM]