Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood Cancels Shows: Faces Boycott Threats

Jonny Greenwood and Dudu Tassa have called off two UK performances after a pro-Palestinian group urged a boycott. The event organizers “received enough credible threats to determine that it is unsafe” to proceed with the concerts, the artists stated in a letter shared on social media. “It is unreasonable to expect them to pay for our protection or that of our audience,” they further expressed.

Jonny Greenwood, Dudu Tassa, and their band members have condemned what they call “censorship.” “Intimidating concert venues (…) will not aid in achieving the peace and justice deserved in the Middle East,” they wrote. “Artists should be allowed to express themselves regardless of their nationality or religion – and certainly independent of the actions of their governments,” they added.

An “extraordinary waste of energy”

The group advocating for the boycott of the concerts, the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), has celebrated the cancellations. “We repeat our call for all venues to refuse to host” these concerts, it stated on X. PACBI, which is part of the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions against Israel) movement, accuses Jonny Greenwood and Dudu Tassa of being “accomplices to genocide in Gaza.”

BDS criticizes Jonny Greenwood for a concert he performed in Tel Aviv in May 2024. It also targets Radiohead, “perhaps the most famous band to have defied calls” to boycott Israel. In October, Thom Yorke, Radiohead’s lead singer, was confronted by a pro-Palestinian spectator during a concert in Melbourne, Australia. “How many dead children will it take for you to condemn the genocide in Gaza?” a member of the audience asked while Yorke was giving a solo performance. Thom Yorke responded sharply by accusing him of ruining the concert and challenged him to come on stage: “Don’t just stand there like a coward, come up here and say it to my face.”

Already in 2017, the British band had denounced a campaign urging them to cancel a concert in Israel, calling the boycott calls an “extraordinary waste of energy.”