Artists boycotting Download announce Palestine fundraiser: “Hardcore is solidarity”
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(Credits: Far Out / Download Festival)
After multiple artists announced a boycott of Download Festival earlier this week, in solidarity with Palestine, a cohort of these artists have organised an alternative show set to take place on June 14th. Spearheaded by Leeds-based thrash metal outfit Pest Control, who were the first group to announce the boycott, the gig is set to donate all proceeds to Palestinian aid charities.
With Download Festival due to take place this weekend at Donnington Park, questions have been raised about the festival’s sponsorship by Barclays. The bank has been criticised in recent months for its financial ties to arms manufacturing, supplying weapons to Israeli forces in Gaza. As a result, Pest Control announced that they would be pulling out of the line-up on June 10th, and hardcore bands like Scowl, Zulu and Speed soon joined the boycott.
Now, these groups have organised an alternate show for June 14th, when many of them were due to take to the stage at Download. Taking place at Centrala in Birmingham, just under an hour away from the Download site, the gig will feature Speed, Scowl, Zulu and Pest Control as well as Brighton punks Ikhras, in addition to the local Birmingham groups Cauldron and Transistrrr.
Announcing the show on social media, Pest Control shared, “Hardcore is solidarity, unity and always anti-fascist. Alternative music is inherently political, what is the point of playing aggressive music, if you’re not angry at the right things,” adding, “Grateful to the family for standing up for something”.
Download Festival is only days away, and more artists have been joining the boycott day-by-day. On June 11th, Negative Frame revealed they would no longer be performing at the festival, writing on Instagram, “Just imagine a piece of every card transaction at the fest going towards real evil terror. We are not part of it”.
Thus far, the bands boycotting Download have been somewhat limited to the smaller bookings, none of the major headliners have acknowledged the boycott at the time of writing. However, Soft Play previously boycotted Brighton’s The Great Escape Festival – another event targeted by the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement (BDS) – therefore, it would not be surprising if they took a stand against Download too.
Barclays is also a major sponsor of The Isle of Wight Festival, Camp Bestival, Lytham Festival and Latitude among many others. Recently, multiple artists, including Irish singer-songwriter CMAT announced a boycott of Latitude in solidarity with Palestine.
