Macklemore has responded after he was dropped from opening the remaining dates of Ed Sheeran’s Loop Tour following his on-stage comments in support of a Palestinian state.
Commission shop The rapper took to Instagram after Sheeran’s tour promoter released a statement to Rolling Stone on Monday claiming that US tour venues told the company they “would not allow the concert to go ahead with Macklemore in the lineup.”
“As the concert promoter of Ed Sheeran’s US Loop Tour, we have been notified by venues of the upcoming US tour dates that they will not allow a concert with Macklemore in the lineup, which will result in the cancellation of the tour and impact hundreds of thousands of fans. Following discussions with interested parties, Macklemore will not perform on the remaining support days,” Messina Touring Group, promoter of the US leg of Sheeran’s Loop Tour, told the publication.
In response, Macklemore wrote: “I don’t know where to start. So I’m going to speak from my heart and share the truth. Ed Sheeran and his team have more right to remove me from The Loop tour.”
“But before I get to that, I want to say something that should be obvious. At this point, I think it matters. I am not a victim. Ed Sheeran is not a victim. Pink is not a victim. We have careers, money, opportunities, security and an audience around the world. Whatever consequences each of us faces for what we say, we can go home to our families.
“The victims are the Palestinian people. The men, women and children who were killed, starved, were displaced and forced to live in conditions of unimaginable violence. More than 20,000 children were killed in Gaza alone. People are being killed today, and people will be killed tomorrow. I want to make sure that as we tell this story, we don’t lose sight of that,” McLemore continued.
“Last Monday, in the midst of the media attention surrounding Pink and what I said at MetLife, Ed told me that he got a call from Robert Kraft. Later this month we were supposed to play at Gillette Stadium, which is owned by the Kraft Group. Ed told me that Kraft said that I would not be allowed to play at his stadium. Ed also told me that Kraft rallied some of the other owners of the stadium, and together they gave him an ultimatum: if Macklemore stayed on the tour, you would not If you do, we will be allowed to play on our grounds,” he added.
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Global News reached out to Kraft representatives for additional comment but did not receive a response.
Can’t hold us back The rapper said Sheeran, who he said is like a “brother” to him, was “on a roll.”
“He knew this. His typically apolitical stance was being questioned in a way that had never been done before. He told me that the words ‘Free Palestine’ and the image of the Palestinian flag were offensive to many of the people he spoke to. I told him that if those words were more offensive than the tens of thousands of Palestinian children killed by Israel, then there was a fundamental gap between where these people stood and where I stood. But he could not escape his public statement: “I don’t take sides.” McLemore wrote.
“And I understand why people don’t. Taking sides can cost you. Money, brand deals, sponsorships, festivals, private shows, relationships and access. I lost all of those things. But there is no neutral ground between the oppressor and the oppressed. When one side has bombs and bottomless financial and military support from America, refusing to take sides will not leave you in the middle,” he continued.
Macklemore went on to say that what he said on stage during the Sept. 4 MetLife concert is something he’s “been saying on stages around the world for almost three years now.”
“So why is this a problem now? Because I’m now sharing the stage with one of the greatest artists in the world, in some of the biggest stadiums in America. At a certain level of exposure, Free Palestine becomes too much of a risk. If I kept doing shows saying Free Palestine, with Ed implicitly supporting it, the crowd getting loud and showing undeniable support for the liberation of Palestine, what artist might perform next? The stage becomes resistance. Maybe that’s why this time it became so important to silence me,” the 43-year-old rapper wrote.
McLemore said he hopes this isn’t “the end of my relationship with Ed.”
“Thirteen years of friendship will not disappear because of one painful disagreement. I hope that we will both continue to listen, study what is happening in Palestine, and grapple with what neutrality means in a moment like this. My door will always be open to continue this conversation,” he added.
The rapper said he doesn’t need 10 Sheeran performances.
“I needed 2.2 chances to stand in front of 90,000 people and say the words that somehow became too dangerous to say. Free Palestine. But if those words cost me the stage and the conversation came back to Palestine, then this was the most successful tour I’ve ever been on,” Macklemore wrote.
Global News reached out to Sheeran’s rep for comment but did not receive a response.
Macklemore first faced backlash for his onstage comments during his Sept. 4 performance at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium, where he said “free Palestine” before performing his protest song. Hinds Hall, about pro-Palestinian demonstrators in Colombia.
“To all my Jewish brothers and sisters: criticizing Israel, criticizing apartheid, speaking out against genocide is in no way a criticism of you,” he said in his speech. “My message is for peace; love for all people who should be treated with dignity, respect and equality. So I say free Palestine, I say free Lebanon, I say free Cuba, I say free Congo, free Sudan, free all the people in America living in fear of this terrorist organization ICE. None of us will be free until we are all free.”
Following Macklemore’s comments, the Israeli American Council launched a petition calling for Sheeran to be removed from the tour.
“This was an Ed Sheeran concert – not a political rally, protest or activist event. The issue is not whether Macklemore has the right to hold political views. The issue is where to draw the line when an opening act uses a global concert platform to promote a one-sided political agenda,” the petition reads.
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