Radiohead’s Thom Yorke isn’t keeping quiet when it comes to how he handles his shows.
The singer was performing a solo show in Melbourne, Australia on October 30 when he was confronted by a defiant crowd about the ongoing war in the Middle East between Israel and Hamas.
The man shouted comments about “Israel’s genocide in Gaza” and also made comments about the deaths of children. This caused Yorke to stop his performance and ask the salesman to come and say those comments to his face.
“Come here and say it. Right here, come on,” Yorke said, holding his guitar.
Others in the audience booed the booer and another person even told the man to “shut up.”
“Get on the f–king stage and say what you want to say. Don’t stand there like a coward, come here and say it. You want p–s on everyone’s night?” Yorke added.
The man kept screaming and responded with another comment about Gaza and Yorke seemed to have had enough at this point.
“Okay, you do it, see you later,” he said before walking off the stage.
“Don’t stand there like a coward, come here and talk!”
Radiohead’s Thom Yorke has responded to an anti-Israel hacker who repeatedly shouted about Gaza throughout his show in Melbourne today.
Yorke left the stage and returned after the crowd chased away the protesters. pic.twitter.com/a5yhtBWpTo
– Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) October 30, 2024
Yorke left the stage only to return later where he would go on to perform Radiohead’s “Karma Police”.
Yorke is on the Everything tour, in which he plays solo songs as well as songs by Radiohead and his spin-off group The Smile.
This is not the first time Yorke has faced problems in the Middle East. In 2017, he defended Radiohead’s decision to perform in Tel Aviv.
“We don’t support Netanyahu any more than Trump, but we still play in America,” Yorke said. Billboard.
Radiohead have a long history with Israel, with their first hit “Creep” first achieving success on Israeli radio, and the band has performed in the country throughout their career.
In May, Radiohead musician Jonny Greenwood was criticized for playing a show in Tel Aviv with Israeli artist Dudu Tassa. This prompted him to respond with a lengthy statement.
“No art is as ‘important’ as stopping all the death and suffering around us. How could that be? But doing nothing seems a worse option. And silencing Israeli artists because of being born Jewish in Israel does not seem to be any way to solve this problem.” reach an understanding between the two sides on this seemingly endless conflict,” he said, according to Guardian.
Tags Thom Yorke, Radiohead