16 Brave Singers Who Survived Absolutely Brutal Stage Falls

16 Brave Singers Who Survived Absolutely Brutal Stage Falls

Some of us can barely make it from the kitchen to our bedroom without tripping over our on feet, so we’re endlessly impressed by these performers who get back up on the stage, no matter how many times they end up nosediving in front of a crowd.

These 16 onstage wipeouts were particularly memorable, and prove that cringing is basically an occupational hazard when you’re a music star.

1. Blake Shelton

After falling during a concert in Pendleton, Oregon, in July 2018, PEOPLE’s 2017 Sexiest Man Alive turned to Twitter to poke fun at his actions and ask for the evidence.

“Ok Pendleton I know somebody is bound to have video of me falling on stage last night!!” he posted. “Please!! I have to see it!!! Post that s—t And yes I had been drinking. A lot.”

Fans supplied footage from multiple angles of Gwen Stefani’s boyfriend stumbling before righting himself and picking up his guitar.

Shelton pointed a finger at Pitbull, his fellow performer at the Pendleton Whisky Music Fest, for getting him a little too lubricated. “By the way @pitbull…I blame you,” Shelton wrote on Twitter. “It was my attempt at competing with your show… I am a dancing son of a bitch when I don’t take a 10 second giant s—t fall….”

2. Shawn Mendes
A mid-set jump turned into a mid-set jump straight down into the pit during the singer’s July 2018 concert in Quebec City.

A Twitter user caught the scary moment, but Mendes replied — in good health. “LOL yep. Im ok but also that was insane hahahahaha,” he wrote.

3. Madonna
Madge famously ended up on the floor when her theatrical cape failed to properly rip off near the beginning of a 2015 Brit Awards performance.

The musical icon was able to stand back up and finish the song, but she later revealed that the wardrobe malfunction had put her in serious danger of a head injury. “I didn’t hurt my butt, I hurt my head,” she said on The Jonathan Ross Show. “I know how to fall. I’ve fallen off my horse many times, and I tucked, and I have good core strength, but the thing is, I had a little bit of a whiplash, and I smacked the back of my head. So, there was a man standing over me with a flashlight until about 3 a.m. making sure that I was still compos mentis.”

“It was a horrible nightmare, because I like to be amazing,” she added. “Seriously, I rehearse and I rehearse and I rehearse, so that when I do the show it’s effortless and I create magic, and I did the opposite.”

4. Demi Lovato
Warning: Stages are slippery when went. Lovato found out as much while performing at a pool party to promote her 2015 single “Cool For The Summer” in some very high heels.

Lovato was a good sport about the fall, quickly jumping into the pool after the tumble and even posting a video of the incident on Instagram with “#NOTCoolForTheSummer.”

5. Luke Bryan
The country singer got a little caught up in his booty shaking at a 2014 concert in Charlotte, North Carolina, and ended up falling right off the stage.

Security guards helped Bryan back up and he was able to finish the concert mostly unharmed.

The next day, Bryan updated his fans on Twitter, revealing that he received a few stitches after the mishap.

Like any good managers, his team also chimed in to share some pics and throw some playful jabs at the star, who had taken a few previous mid-show tumbles.

6. Justin Bieber
When you perform as much as Bieber, you’re bound to have a few falls, so it’s no surprise that the “Sorry” singer has several spills to his name.

One particularly memorable snafu took place in Saskatoon, Canada, in 2016, when he didn’t notice an open trap door. Bieber seemingly disappeared as he fell through the hole in the stage with an alarming thud.

Luckily, Biebs was able to crawl back out unscathed. “Good thing I’m like a cat and I landed on my feet — oh my God,” he joked to the audience. “That scared the f— outta me.”

The resilient star also took a handful of other Purpose tour falls:

7. Harry Styles
The One Direction charmer completely ate it at a 2015 show in San Diego, California.

The boy bander appeared to get tripped up by his microphone as the group sang “Through The Dark,” prompting him to go down in spectacular fashion.

Styles recovered with a smile, and the One Direction boys later reminisced on their many stumbles on Ellen. “That one was bad,” Styles said of the San Diego accident. “The worst part of that is all my friends were there. Right at the front.”

8. Ariana Grande
Grande’s ultra high heels may have been her literal downfall during a Toronto concert.

After the slip, the star quickly got back to her feet and continued strutting and belting out “Bang Bang.”

9. Iggy Azalea
The rapper fell clear off the stage while performing “Fancy” at a 2014 MTV Video Music Awards benefit concert.

Impressively, Azalea continued to rap from below the stage as security scrambled to help her back up.

After the show, Azalea shared a video of the fall on Instagram, writing “Sorry but it would be a crime not to share this with you all, I know I laughed. #StillFinishedtheSongTho #KeptOnRapping #TheShowMustGoOn.”

10. Meghan Trainor
At a May 2016 appearance on The Tonight Show, Trainor collapsed on the floor at the end of her song “Me Too.”

Although she appeared to hurt her ankle on the way down, the singer was in good spirits after the fall, laughing as host Jimmy Fallon joined her on the floor.

Trainor took to Twitter to assure her fans that she was okay after the late night blunder.

11. Selena Gomez
A pesky set of stairs cost Gomez her first fall of her 2016 Revival tour.

The starlet was singing “Kill Em with Kindness” in Tulsa, Oklahoma, when she went down. “First fall on the whole damn tour. Can you believe it,” she laughed, clearly unfazed by the slip that may have embarrassed us mere mortals.

12. Pink
A performance in Nuremberg, Germany, became a very scary situation in 2010 when a harness used for one of Pink’s aerial stunts was not properly secured.

The harness launched her into the crowd barricade during “So What,” sending the popstar from the arena to a hospital.

Pink tweeted to her fans on her way to get medical care, and later updated them with the good news that she had not been seriously injured.

13. Dave Grohl
In perhaps the most serious accident of them all, the Foo Fighters frontman suffered a broken leg after falling from a Gothenburg, Sweden, stage.

“I think I just broke my leg. I think I really broke my leg,” Grohl told the crowd from the ground. Amazingly, Grohl returned to the stage about an hour later via a stretcher, and proceeded to perform with his freshly broken leg for over two more hours.

The band tweeted proof of their fearless leader’s injury after the show.

Unfortunately the broken bone forced the Foo Fighters to cancel several subsequent shows. But Grohl eventually returned to the tour with his broken leg and simply performed while sitting on a throne.

Nick Wass/AP
Nick Wass/AP

His orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Lew C. Schon, even joined him onstage at a Boston show.

14. Ed Sheeran
While opening for bestie Taylor Swift on her 2013 Red tour, the singer-songwriter misjudged his ability to jump onto a piece of sound equipment, and ended up heading for the floor.

Sheeran launched from the fall into a rather impressive somersault-type move, and continued singing “You Need Me, I Don’t Need You” for the Omaha, Nebraska, audience.

15. Paula Abdul
Two steps too many forward? During an October 2018 show in Mississippi, Abdul took a head-first tumble as she performed at the Hard Rock Live. In a fan’s video of the mishap, Abdul was entertaining the crowd during her Straight Up Paula! tour when she danced dangerously close to the stage’s edge.

Singing her 1991 single “The Promise of a New Day” while wearing heels, Abdul clapped her hands and encouraged the audience to “c’mon” before falling into the audience. Though Abdul’s reaction could not be heard through the speakers, multiple concertgoers shrieked out of concern for the star. She finished the performance and days later, posted that she was fine following the incident.

16. Lady Gaga

While performing during her sold-out Las Vegas residency show Enigma in October 2019, the singer plummeted off of Park MGM’s Park Theater stage, landing in the pit of the audience on her back.

At the time, Gaga was being held by a male fan who she had invited onstage with her (a treat for one lucky concertgoer she builds into every show before a stripped-down performance of her hit, “A Million Reasons”).

Kevin Mazur/Getty
Kevin Mazur/Getty

She had climbed into the man’s arms while greeting him with a hug after he was pulled from the audience, but he lost his footing while bouncing her around, slipping and falling.

Luckily, Gaga quickly recovered — returning to the stage and continuing the show.

“Everything’s okay. Everything’s okay,” she said from the pit, as captured on video. “The only thing that’s not okay is we need some stairs for the damn stage so I can get back up!”

Ever the professional, Gaga even went on to assure the visibly shaken fan that she wasn’t angry.

“Can you promise me something?” she asked him. “Will you just forgive yourself right now for that happening? It takes two to tango!”​