Axl Rose, the lead singer of Gun N’ Roses, allegedly hit a woman in the face with a microphone, causing her serious injuries.
The incident happened at a recent concert by the legendary rock band at the Adelaide Oval in Australia. Music fan Rebecca Howe was one of the thousands of people there to see the band play.
At the end of the band’s set, Rose, who was 60 years old at the time, threw his microphone into the crowd and accidentally hit Howe in the face.
Howe talked about the painful time on 10 News First, saying:
The last song was ‘Paradise City’, and [Rose] bowed to the crowd and chucked – or launched – the microphone into the crowd.
It hit me on the bridge of the nose and it felt like I’d been hit by a truck. And I instantly put my head down and my hands in my face […] my brain was like, ‘Oh my god, my face has been caved in and my nose has been broken’
She said that the bright stage lights made it hard for her to see what was coming.
If it hit me in the eye, I could have lost an eye,
Howe said – while sporting two black eyes.
I still can’t believe it. Out of 20,000 people, it was me.
Howe also told the Adelaide Advertiser that after the impact caused her to start bleeding, she started to hyperventilate and had to be pulled to the side by a police officer who wasn’t on duty.
When Howe’s story went viral on social media, Rose responded to the situation by saying:
It’s come to my attention that a fan may have been hurt at our show in Adelaide, Australia possibly being hit by the microphone at the end of the show when I traditionally toss the mic to the fans.
If true obviously we don’t want anyone getting hurt or to somehow in anyway hurt anyone at any of our show anywhere.
Having tossed the mic at the end of our show for over 30 years we always felt it was a known part of the very end of our performance that fans wanted and were aware of to have an opportunity to catch the mic.
Regardless in the interest of public safety from now on we’ll refrain from tossing the mic or anything to fans during or at our performances.
— Axl Rose (@axlrose) December 2, 2022
Rose also made sure to say that the mic throw wasn’t done with bad intentions and that the whole thing was just a bad accident:
Unfortunately there are those that for their own reasons chose to frame their reporting regarding this subject in a more negative n’ irresponsible out of nowhere light which couldn’t be farther from reality.
