Festival axes concert over artist’s online posts
UP+DT organizer says Misfits singer doesn’t fit with event’s philosophies
A local music festival has dropped a performance under its banner by Misfits lead singer Michale Graves because of his political views.
In a statement Wednesday, Up and Downtown Music Festival specifically announced, “the cancellation of Michale Graves’ UP+DT 2018 performance, scheduled for Oct. 6 at Temple nightclub.
“Mr. Graves’ social media accounts were recently brought to our attention. Upon review, his views expressed do not align with the UP+DT’s strive to build a safe and inclusive festival experience. Regardless of the popularity for Mr. Graves and the sold-out show, full refunds will be offered at point of purchase.”
The festival’s artistic director Brent Oliver followed up in a phone interview.
“It was brought to our attention that we should probably take a look at Michale Graves’s Twitter and Instagram. We did, and found one of his recent Tweets with a song of his — a piano and acoustic song on his YouTube channel — spliced together with an Alex Jones speech. He had a Trump shirt on one of his Instagram posts, Trump holding the severed head of Kathy Griffin.
“When we dug a little deeper, there was another video, why MTV is racist toward white people. He likes and replies to Breitbart and other alt-right thinkers online. “It was basically, like, ‘nope.’” Oliver, who originally served as promoter for Graves’ show in his UP+DT role, said, “Let me be perfectly clear. He is welcome to play anywhere else. He just does not align with what the festival is all about. If somebody else wants to take it on, it’s a sold-out show. Have at ’er.”
Oliver says it’s up to the festival who they hire.
“Believe whatever you believe, post whatever you want on social media — it doesn’t mean we have to book it. If he’s going to play anywhere else in town, I’m not going to go. Everyone else is welcome to go. That’s what I’m arguing with all the trolls on Facebook right now.”
Graves, lead singer of the Misfits on and off between 1995 and 2000, could not be reached for comment.
Graves’ opening acts Moving Bodies, the Devil’s Sons and the Preying Saints have been moved upstairs to UP+DT’s presentation of afrobeat ensemble Antibalas. Guadalajara, Mexico’s Canibales have also been added to the now two-stage bill. UP+DT runs Oct. 5-7 at 11 venues with 80 acts.
Originally fronted by Glenn Danzig, the horror-punk Misfits have had a number of singers over the years.
The promoter underlines, “Michale Graves is welcome to say whatever he wants online, the same way Up and Downtown is welcome to book whoever we like, based on our ideals, our policies, our politics. We are a not-for-profit organization run by a board of nine people, and we have a unified policy toward our booking.
“We try and have a gender balance, we try and have representation of Indigenous acts, we try and have genre representation — everything form hip-hop to metal.
“But this does not fit into our philosophies of inclusion, of no barriers, and we have a safe space going in this year.
“We cannot in good conscience have someone who posts things that are antithetical to what we believe as an organization.”
Moving forward, Oliver considers whether they’ll have to scrutinize potential musicians’ social media history.
“Maybe. There’s going to have to be a procedure.”