KING 810 is a heavy metal band that had a big gig in Chicago coming up. They were scheduled to play Thalia Hall on Dec. 18 but the promoters at the hall decided to cancel the whole gig for the band because they use excessive guns and violent imagery on stage.
In lieu of the 701 murders in the city of Chicago through November, the venue promoter told the band he was having a tough time defending the gig in light of Chicago’s gun violence epidemic.
KING 810 appears on stage with masked characters dressed in black and armed with automatic weapons. Their first album includes “Killem All” and Murder Murder Murder.” David Gunn, the band’s frontman, notified the band of the cancellation through the band’s Facebook page.
A Tweet on the band King 810’s Twitter page shows the letter they received from the venue.
The venue promoter said, “We have been receiving phone calls from people in the neighborhood asking why the show is being allowed to happen. Specifically they are [citing] the band’s excessive use of guns and violent imagery.”
The email adds, “We are ending 2016 with the highest rate of gun violence in Chicago’s history and people are particularly sensitive. Defending the show, in the current environment, is becoming more and more difficult.”
Gunn responded to the email and said, “The gun thing is part of the culture where we’re from, it’s inherently part of the band. It’s not something that we apologize for or regret or anything like that.”
Gunn added that to him the Bataclan massacre in Paris is an excessive use of guns. “Guns are a part of our lives and we’re not going to be caught in this type of situation. So with all due respect to anyone in this type of situation if anyone ever comes through the front door with an automatic rifle, they’re not going to be able to kill 150 people at a KING show, they’ll probably be shot from the stage. So, the guns aren’t going away, and we don’t apologize for anything.”
[revad2]
