Kneecap performed at Wembley on Thursday night and, during the concert, Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh and his band made some X-rated slurs about Donald Trump and his state visit
Belfast rap trio Kneecap slammed Donald Trump’s state visit to the UK – during a rousing gig at Wembley last night.
The band told fans music artists are “filling a void” left by politicians, taking aim at the US President hours after he left the UK for the US following his three-day trip. Mid performance, during a break between songs, one of the band members could be heard saying: “Is Donald Trump in f****** England? For f**** sake.”
And, before taking to the stage at their London show, a message was displayed on the wall that read: “Starmer welcomed Isaac Herzog to this city like a king last week. Today Trump is here, the man who permits the slaughter.”
Mr Starmer met with Israel’s President at Number 10 last week, after which a Downing Street spokesperson described the Doha bombing by Israel as a ‘flagrant violation’, and also called out the ‘manmade famine’ in Gaza.
Kneecap’s performance at Glastonbury in the summer sparked controversy, and led to criticism from fans. Police launched a criminal investigation after they reviewed footage of Kneecap’s set, but eventually decided to take “no further action”.
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But it didn’t cut Kneecap’s edge at Wembley, where Naoise O Caireallain, who performs under the stage name Moglai Bap, added “release the f****** files”, appearing to make reference to calls for the Trump administration to put all documents related to the Jeffrey Epstein investigations before the public.
Liam Og O hAnnaidh, also known as Mo Chara, then led the crowd in chants of “f*** the Royal Family”, having also led them in chants of “f*** Keir Starmer”.
Supported by Irish post-punk band Gurriers and London artist Jelani Blackman, the evening also saw a special audio-visual presentation from trip hop collective Massive Attack followed by a speech from director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Ben Jamal.
The group, which also includes JJ O’Dochartaigh (DJ Provai) performed tracks including Better Way To Live, featuring Fontaines DC singer Grian Chatten, Sick In The Head and Hood.
In another address to the audience, O hAnnaidh added: “People like us, people like Massive Attack, other acts that decide to use their time on stage to talk about Palestine. At the end of the day, all we’re doing is filling a void that the politicians aren’t filling.
“The reasons that musician and artists are always the people that are the spearhead of these kind of campaigns and movements is because the politicians won’t do it.
“And what happens is artists have platforms like this where we can talk to people without interference from the Government, on the most part.”