Live Nation Festivals Drop Barclays Sponsorship

Following the mass artist boycott of this year’s Great Escape Festival in May, where over 100 acts that were booked to play the Brighton festival withdrew from the lineup in support of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, which claims that Barclays Bank has “financial ties to companies producing weapons and military technology used in Israel’s attacks on Palestinians”, Live Nation festivals has removed Barclays as a sponsor across its events including this weekend’s Download Festival, and the upcoming Isle Of Wight and Latitude festivals.

Tom Morello @ Electric Ballroom

Tom Morello @ Electric Ballroom following his announcement of the Barclays sponsorship withdrawal (Kalpesh Patel)

Making the announcement live on stage at London’s Electric Ballroom on Thursday evening (13th June), Rage Against The Machine and Audioslave guitarist Tom Morello, who ultimately played Download Festival this weekend, went on to share the news via social media:

“BREAKING: Barclays ends sponsorship of @DownloadFest @IsleOfWightFest & @LatitudeFest! A bank funding war crimes has no place at music festivals. The fact that Download has listened to its musicians and cut ties with Barclays Bank is a testament to the power of artists taking collective action for human rights. I’ve been pushing hard for this behind the scenes for some time and I salute all the artists who have taken a stand to help make this historic withdrawal happen.” – See the original post below:

Tom Morello @ Electric Ballroom

Tom Morello @ Electric Ballroom (Kalpesh Patel)

In a statement issued to Sky News, Latitude Festival said: “Following discussion with artists, we have agreed with Barclays that they will step back from sponsorship of Latitude Festival”. Artists including CMAT, Pillow Queens, mui zyu and Georgia Ruth alongside comedians Joanne McNally, Sophie Duker, Grace Campbell, and Alexandra Haddow had previously announced that they would boycott the festival this year in protest of Barclays’ sponsorship. This weekend’s Download Festival had already seen the bands Pest Control, Speed, Scowl, Zulu and Ithaca drop out.

Sharing the news of the campaign’s success via Instagram, the Bands Boycott Barclays initiative stated:

“WE DID IT!!!!! Hundreds of artists took collective action in solidarity with Palestine and Barclaycard are no longer on the websites of @downloadfest @latitudefest @isleofwightfest @campbestival. This is a HISTORIC victory for the Palestinian-led global BDS movement!!!

Musicians have destroyed Barclays’ dual strategy of financing genocide in Palestine while advertising its brand and “customer perks” at British music festivals. This is the power of solidarity, collective action and the dedicated global commitment to do all we can for Palestinian liberation.”

Check out the post in full below.

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