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NOFX lose sponsorship deal following Las Vegas shooting comments

By | Published on Thursday 31 May 2018

NOFX

NOFX have lost a sponsorship deal after they were filmed making jokes about the Route 91 Harvest festival shooting that took place in Las Vegas last year.

During a set at the Punk Rock Bowling & Music Festival, also in Vegas, last Sunday, NOFX frontman Fat Mike said: “We played a song about Muslims and we didn’t get shot, alright!” To which guitarist Eric Melvin responded: “You only get shot in Vegas if you’re in a country band”. Fat Mike concurred: “That sucked, but at least they were country fans and not punk rock fans”.

The skit drew groans from the crowd, most of whom are presumably used to this sort of thing from the controversy courting band. However, once the video made it out into the world, it drew strong criticism. This led the Stone Brewing Co, which manufactures a NOFX branded beer and sponsors the band’s own festival, to announce that it would be cutting ties with them.

“We at Stone Brewing are aware of NOFX’s insensitive and indefensible statements this past weekend”, said a spokesperson for the company. “As a result, we are severing all our ties with NOFX, including festival sponsorship and the production of our collaboration beer”.

They continued: “We respect punk rock, and the DIY ethos for which it stands. To us, it means standing up for things you believe in, and fearlessly committing to what’s right. And it is for that reason that Stone Brewing is immediately disassociating ourselves from the band NOFX. Stone had a sponsorship deal for this summer’s Punk In Drublic festivals. Emphasis ‘had’. That sponsorship is now cancelled”.

They added that the company will donate all profits from sales of the band’s beer, also called Punk In Drublic, to the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Foundation. No further batches of the beer will be brewed after it sells out.

“We apologise to the fans of the beer itself, but know that we make this decision out of respect to all”, the statement concluded. “Punk rock is cool. These callous comments were the furthest thing from it”.

After a gunman opened fire from a nearby hotel during last October’s Route 91 Harvest event, 58 people were killed and hundreds more injured. The incident was the deadliest mass shooting committed by an individual to have ever occurred in the US. The band have not commented on the controversy surrounding their onstage comments.

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