{"id":629224,"date":"2026-09-19T04:30:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-19T04:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/629224\/"},"modified":"2026-09-19T04:30:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-19T04:30:10","slug":"dropkick-murphys-ken-casey-criticizes-ed-sheerans-macklemore-booting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/629224\/","title":{"rendered":"Dropkick Murphys’ Ken Casey Criticizes Ed Sheeran’s Macklemore Booting"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tDropkick Murphys<\/a>\u2018 frontman Ken Casey<\/a> has spoken up about Macklemore<\/a> being forced off<\/a> Ed Sheeran<\/a>\u2019s Loop Tour after the rapper made onstage comments in support of Palestinians and criticized Israel\u2019s war in Gaza.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn an interview with Boston Public Radio, Casey said, \u201cI know that, as a musician for 30 years, anytime we\u2019ve gone on tour we\u2019ve selected the bands that have opened for us \u2014 that\u2019s brotherhood, sisterhood, that\u2019s family. You live or die with the people you bring on the road. They\u2019re your people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHe added: \u201cAnd the fact that Ed Sheeran took the knee, no matter what the cause is, and not stood with his fellow tour partner, just doesn\u2019t, you know, sit right with me. And that\u2019s not how Dropkick Murphys would operate.\u201d Casey comments garnered applause during the taping.<\/p>\n

\n\tCasey said that the promoter is not the entity that should dictate what happens at a show. \u201cThe promoter is not what the people come to see.\u201d (Sheeran said the decision to remove Macklemore was not his<\/a>, but that of the promoter Messina Touring Group, combined with pressure from venues. As well, per a statement from Macklemore, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft allegedly<\/a> led a pressure campaign<\/a> to force him off The Loop Tour<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\n\tCasey gave an example: the band has long been outspoken about the Trump administration and during the Rocklahoma Festival in Oklahoma, he said, \u201cwe said what we have to say onstage every night, and probably about 50 percent of the audience walked away.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAnd I was told immediately afterwards that angered the owner of the site, and I\u2019m sure we won\u2019t get invited back,\u201d Casey continued.<\/p>\n

\t\tTrending Stories<\/p>\n

\n\tCasey insisted it\u2019s important to stand up for your beliefs. \u201cAll the artists I loved as a kid, no matter what, it was that they stand by what they sing about,\u201d he said. \u201cOnce you let that go, then you don\u2019t have any worth in your music if you ask me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMacklemore appears to hold a similar mindset; he doubled down on his stance after his removal from the tour,\u00a0pledging to donate $1 million<\/a>\u00a0to Palestinian support groups and challenged Kraft \u201cto match\u201d him.\u00a0Kraft responded with a statement<\/a>, claiming that Sheeran called him and asked him to \u201cto commit $2 million to match his donation to aid in the region to fight this humanitarian crisis.\u201d A rep for Sheeran did not immediately respond to\u00a0Rolling Stone\u2019s request for comment about the statement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dropkick Murphys\u2018 frontman Ken Casey has spoken up about Macklemore being forced off Ed Sheeran\u2019s Loop Tour after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":629225,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[321,2126,267175,8720,93,61,60,267176,264671],"class_list":["post-629224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-controversy","tag-dropkick-murphys","tag-ed-sheeran","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-ken-casey","tag-macklemore"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=629224"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629224\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/629225"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=629224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=629224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=629224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}