Dutch venue cancels Bob Vylan show over Charlie Kirk comments

UK punk rap duo Bob Vylan have had their upcoming gig in the Netherlands cancelled over comments they made on stage about Charlie Kirk's death.

While performing at Amsterdam's Paradiso on Saturday, frontman Bobby Vylan called the American conservative influencer "an absolute piece of shit of a human being."

"The pronouns was/were," Vylan said, adding, "'Cause if you chat shit, you will get banged. Rest in piss Charlie Kirk, you piece of shit."

As a result, the 013 music venue in Tilburg cancelled the band's planned September 16 show, writing in a statement the comments "no longer fall within the scope of what we can offer a platform."

"While we understand that these statements were made in the context of punk and activism, and that the reporting on them is sometimes less nuanced than what actually happened, we still believe these new statements go too far," said 013 in a statement.

013 added they were hesitant to book Bob Vylan after their Glastonbury set, where the duo led a chant of "death, death to the IDF" in reference to the Israel Defence Forces.  As a result of the chant, the Avon and Somerset Police launched a criminal investigation into the band and their U.S. visas were revoked, forcing them to cancel their autumn U.S. tour.

013 said they went ahead with the show once Bob Vylan insisted that the chant was "not an antisemitic slogan, but rather criticism of the Israeli army."

The band posted a video on X, in which Bobby Vylan states, "At no point during yesterday's show was Charlie Kirk's death celebrated."

"I did call him a piece of shit, that much is true, but at no point was his death celebrated," Vylan said.

"What did happen is one reporter that bought their ticket online came with the sole purpose of finding something to report and after I called [Kirk] a piece of shit and we played a song, they have written that up as a celebration. It’s not a celebration."

In a separate post on X, Bob Vylan posted photos of the Amsterdam gig with the caption, "They want us down so bad but we just played a sold out Paradiso."