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In 2020, the Illinois teenager Kyle Rittenhouse became a right-wing cause celebre after shooting three men at an anti-police brutality protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin, killing two of them. Rittenhouse was charged with homicide, and he was acquitted after pleading self-defense. Later this month, Rittenhouse will appear as a VIP guest at the Orlando metal festival Shell Shock II. Rittenhouse’s booking has caused a number of bands to drop off of the festival lineup and the organizers, who blame “the liberal mob” for the cancelations, to book a Slipknot cover band as their replacement headliners.
Shell Shock bills itself as a “PTSD charity and awareness event, and it’s hosted by something called The Antihero Podcast. Earlier this week, as MetalSucks reported, Florida metalcore act Evergreen Terrace, the festival’s previously-announced headliner, dropped off the lineup. In a since-deleted Facebook statement, the band wrote:
Evergreen Terrace has always supported and continues to support philanthropic events for veterans, PTSD awareness, child poverty, and many more, but we will not align with an event promoting a perceived murderer such as Kyle Rittenhouse capitalizing off of their pseudo celebrity. Unfortunately we did not do our due diligence with this particular event. Even after they offered to pull Kyle from the event, we discovered several associated entities that we simply do not agree with. As advocates for free speech we are respectfully canceling the Shell Shock festival. We will be personally contributing to a veterans charity and urge you to do the same. The promoters have been nothing less than understanding.
“Lines we draw in the sand…depend on where we stand.”
See you soon, Orlando.
After Evergreen Terrace dropped off the festival, the bands Southpaw, Let Me Bleed, and American Hollow followed suit, as Loudwire reports. In an Instagram post, The Antihero Podcast responded by writing, “We have been silent. But we are prepping. The liberal mob attempted to destroy Shell Shock. But we will not allow it. This is now about more than a concert. This is a war of ideology.” On Wednesday, Shell Shock announced that SiC, a Slipknot tribute act from Texas, will step in as replacement the new headliner.
The Shell Shock II festival is still apparently going down 10/19 at Orlando’s Level 13 Event Center, so just go ahead and make sure that you’re nowhere nearby on that day.