{"id":402149,"date":"2026-04-20T18:56:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T18:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/402149\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T18:56:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T18:56:08","slug":"the-strokes-call-out-u-s-imperialism-war-during-coachella-set","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/402149\/","title":{"rendered":"The Strokes Call Out U.S. Imperialism, War During Coachella Set"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThe Strokes<\/a> closed out their set at Coachella<\/a> this past Saturday with a performance of their 2016 song \u201cOblivius\u201d<\/a> accompanied by a charged video montage<\/a> detailing decades of alleged CIA-backed atrocities and assassinations, and culminating with footage of recent destruction in Iran<\/a> and Gaza<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tIn a potent echo of the present, the montage began with a photo of former Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh, who was overthrown in a 1953 coup<\/a> backed by British and American intelligence services. Mossadegh\u2019s photo was followed by other world leaders who were either overthrown and, in some cases, assassinated by U.S.-backed operations, including the Congo\u2019s Patrice Lumumba<\/a>, Bolivia\u2019s Juan Torres, and Chile\u2019s Salvador Allende.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThere was also a slide dedicated to a 1999 civil trial in which a jury decided there was a U.S. government conspiracy to assassinate civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. (While it\u2019s well-documented that King was surveilled by the FBI<\/a> and CIA for years, the Department of Justice has repeatedly rejected the conspiracy claim, with a 2000 investigation turning up no evidence of the government\u2019s alleged involvement.)<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Strokes brought their performance to a close with footage of rubble in Iran, with a slide stating that more than 30 universities have been destroyed by U.S. and Israeli airstrikes this year. The final image was of the al-Israa University in Gaza, the last university in the Strip, which Israel destroyed in 2024. During these closing moments, frontman Julian Casablancas<\/a> howled the final refrain from \u201cOblivius,\u201d \u201cWhat side are you standing on?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

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

\n\tWhile the Strokes chose not to end their Weekend One Coachella<\/a> set with this politically-charged montage, the stance should come as no surprise. Casablancas signed a 2021 petition calling for a free Palestine<\/a>, while that same year he hosted a video interview series for Rolling Stone \u2014 S.O.S. \u2014 Earth Is a Mess<\/a> \u2014 that found him discussing American imperialism, Marxism, wealth inequality, and more with a variety of prominent intellectuals on the left.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Strokes are gearing up to release their new album, Reality Awaits<\/a>, on June 26. A North American tour<\/a> will kick off that same month, with shows scheduled through September.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Strokes closed out their set at Coachella this past Saturday with a performance of their 2016 song…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[18371,146,85,46,190382,409,181974],"class_list":{"0":"post-402149","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-coachella","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-il","11":"tag-israel","12":"tag-julian-casablancas","13":"tag-music","14":"tag-the-strokes"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}