Nick Cave has shared his advice with an artist who reached out, saying that they are considering boycotting The Great Escape in solidarity with Palestine.
Dozens of artists who were lined up to play at the 2024 edition of the festival have now pulled out as part of a political stance. This comes as The Great Escape is sponsored by Barclays, which has been a source of controversy amid the events in Gaza because of the bank’s financial investment in companies that supply arms to Israel.
Now, an artist who is booked for this year’s bill has reached out to singer, songwriter and Bad Seeds frontman Nick Cave, asking whether he would recommend showing solidarity with other artists by withdrawing from the event.
“I am a musician who has been booked to play The Great Escape festival, which, as you may have heard, a number of artists are boycotting due to the sponsorship of Barclays. Who, in a non-linear fashion, are profiting from the horror that is occurring in Palestine,” the question to Cave began, posted on his blog The Red Hand Files.
“I do not support the genocide, I would hope the rest of the world feels the same. But as an artist already existing in a very toxic industry, the best many of us can hope for is a few scraps – the glimmer of an opportunity, a gig, anything to help us get our music out into the world, and in turn make it a better place with the love we promote in our art.
“The music industry is a place of being told you need to follow TikTok trends and that labels only look at ‘metrics’. Individuality doesn’t feel celebrated,” it continued.
“I feel as if I am to be judged by my peers and by fans if we don’t cancel our performance, yet my heart tells me that this is ill-advised. I don’t want to be bullied into following a trend, yet I worry my silence makes me look complicit […] It’s a huge expectation on struggling musicians who will be replaced by one of a thousand other hungry musicians if they decide to boycott. What would you do?”
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Sharing a simple response to the musician who reached out, Cave wrote: “Play. Love, Nick.”
The stance from Cave to not boycott the event comes after he drew controversy back in 2017, when The Bad Seeds went ahead with their shows in Tel Aviv despite pressure for them to withdraw from fellow musicians like Roger Waters and Thurston Moore.
“After a lot of thought and consideration I rang up my people and said, ‘We’re doing a European tour and Israel.’ Because it suddenly became very important to me to make a stand against those people who are trying to shut down musicians, to bully musicians, to censor musicians, and to silence musicians,” he said at the time, defending the decision.
“At the end of the day, there’s maybe two reason why I’m here. One is that I love Israel and I love Israeli people, and two is to make a principled stand against anyone who tries to censor and silence musicians. So, really, you could say in a way that the BDS [Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement] made me play Israel.”
He then went on to share an email that he sent Brian Eno around the same time, in which the artist asked him to reconsider the decision. Within the message, Cave labelled the boycott as “cowardly and shameful”, while defending his decision to perform in Israel as a “principled stand against those who wish to bully, shame and silence musicians”.
“I do not support the current government in Israel,” Cave said, “yet do not accept that my decision to play in the country is any kind of tacit support for that government’s policies.”
When asked about the “hypocritical” decision by a fan on the blog, Cave issued a response which read, in part: “The invasion of Ukraine by Russia is simply not the same thing as the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine; one is a brutal unprovoked attack on one state by another, in the hope of revising the entire security structure of Europe, and the other is a deeply complex clash of two nations that is far from straightforward.
“What the two conflicts do share is the tragic fate of all innocents who must cower in bomb shelters in fear of their lives, and I sympathise deeply with all such communities wherever — and whoever — they are.”
The boycott of the 2024 instalment of The Great Escape arose after a petition emerged online, that was started by the promoter How to Catch a Pig and the band The Menstrual Cramps. Since then, it has since been signed by artists including Kneecap, Lambrini Girls, Alfie Templeman, Lip Critic, Wunderhorse and Mary in the Junkyard. The petition can be found here.
“Barclays/Barclaycard are responsible for investing over £1bn+ into companies that are arming the IDF and providing weaponry that enables the ongoing atrocities against Palestinians to continue,” they shared in their statement.
a message from us regarding our performances due to take place at @thegreatescape festival next month. pic.twitter.com/Y20uW75f7H
— CHERYM (@cherymofficial) April 12, 2024
Last month, talent discovery and development programme Future Bubblers also dropped out of hosting a stage at The Great Escape in solidarity with Palestine, namely due to the ties with Barclays.
Elsewhere, two record labels, Alcopop! and Big Scary Monsters, confirmed they were joining the boycott of The Great Escape over its ties to the bank and the “horrendous genocide in Gaza”.
The pressure for artists to pull out of the festival comes shortly after swathes of artists refused to play Austin’s SXSW Festival, due to its connections with the US Army and weapons companies amid the Israel-Gaza conflict.
Gruff Rhys, Kneecap, Sprints, Lambrini Girls, Gel, Rachel Chinouriri, Cardinals and NewDad all eventually pulled out from SXSW, as well as every Irish act on the bill. Many of the artists expressed that they had made the decision out of solidarity with the people of Palestine.
In light of the withdrawals, SXSW released a statement regarding all of the bands and artists who have been pulling out of the festival, saying: “We are an organisation that welcomes diverse viewpoints. Music is the soul of SXSW, and it has long been our legacy. We fully respect the decision these artists made to exercise their right to free speech.”
Explaining its sponsorship with the US Army, SXSW wrote: “The defence industry has historically been a proving ground for many of the systems we rely on today. These institutions are often leaders in emerging technologies, and we believe it’s better to understand how their approach will impact our lives.”