More bands drop out of major festival after Mary Wallopers ‘cut off’ for having Palestinian flag on stage

The Academic is among the acts that pulled out of the festival.

Victorious Festival in Portsmouth has had two more acts pull from the bill following their decision to cut off The Mary Wallopers set.

The Mary Wallopers walked onto the stage at Victorious Festival on Friday, only to have their sound cut off mere seconds later.

The reasoning? Because they brought a Palestinian flag on stage and chanted Free Palestine before breaking into their first, and eventually only song, of the set.

The Academic took to Instagram to announce that they decided to pull from the festival, as they could not 'in good conscience' play somewhere that 'silences free speech and our right to express your views'.

"We stand in solidarity with the other Irish acts here this weekend.

"Up The Mary Wallopers. Free Palestine," they concluded.

Furthermore, the multi-Brit award-winning band The Last Dinner Party stated that they would also be boycotting the festival for the same reason.

"We are outraged by the decision made to silence The Mary Wallopers yesterday at Victorious. As a band we cannot cosign political censorship and will therefore be boycotting the festival today.

"As Gazans are deliberately plunged into catastrophic famine after two years of escalating violence it is urgent and obvious that artists use their platform to draw attention to the cause. To see an attempt to direct attention away from the genocide in order to maintain an apolitical image is immensely disappointing," they added.

"Throughout this summer we have used our stages to encourage our audience to donate even a drink’s worth of money to Medical Aid for Palestinians, and today we urge you more than ever to do the same."

Seconds into The Mary Wallopers set, a Victorious crew member came onto the stage and began speaking with bass player, Róisín Barrett, seemingly asking her to remove the Palestinian flag from her amp.

He then removed the flag from the amp himself, forcing the band to stop playing the song, and chant "Free Palestine".

Seconds later, their sound was cut off.

The Mary Wallopers themselves have released a video of the incident and a statement too.

Their statement reads: "Yesterday, a famine was declared in Gaza, where at least 65 people were killed by Israeli attacks, all the while Israel pushed ahead with plans to split the West Bank in two. These are the important facts about yesterday.

"We are uploading this video so everybody can see @victoriousfestival cut our gig short for having a Palestinian flag on stage. The festival have released a misleading statement to the press claiming they cut our sound because of a discriminatory chant and not the band’s call to Free Palestine.

"Our video clearly shows a Victorious crew member coming on stage, interfering with our show, removing the flag from the stage and then the sound being cut following a chant of “Free Palestine”. The same crew member is later heard in the video saying “you aren’t playing until the flag is removed”.

"We completely reject Victorious’ portrayal of today’s events and request that they retract their statement immediately. We know this is getting some attention and we don’t want another distraction which takes attention away from the genocide that is happening in Palestine. FREE PALESTINE."

Furthermore, the festival itself has now released a statement saying: "We are in the business of putting on great shows, not cutting them off and this is the last thing we wanted, for the band, their fans and ourselves."

They added: "We didn’t handle the explanation of our policies sensitively or far enough in advance to allow a sensible conclusion to be reached. This put the band and our own team in a difficult situation which never should have arisen. We would like to sincerely apologise to all concerned.

"We absolutely support the right of artists to freely express their views from the stage, within the law and the inclusive nature of the event. "

You can read their full statement below:

A number of bands and artists have come out in support of The Mary Wallopers including Kneecap, who wrote: "Our good pals The Mary Wallopers have just been pulled off stage and the PA shut down at @VictoriousFest in Portsmouth for taking out a Palestinian flag and saying Free Palestine.

"Speak up against genocide in England and you're treated like a criminal. Up the Mary Wallopers."