Music

Religious club owner bans metal bands from his club days before their scheduled gig

by Tyler Munro

The opening day of the first ever Decibel Magazine tour isn’t until April 11th, but one religious club owner has already thrown a wrench by banning a handful of bands from performing at his club.

A press release for the tour says that the owners of The Brewmaster’s Gate in Columbus, Ohio have banned Behemoth, Watain, The Devil’s Blood, and In Solitude from performing due to cited “religious conflicts”.

Of course the question here is why it took so long for these venue owners to look into the tour they’d booked (dates were announced in January), but no worries for fans: they’ve already found a new place to play, moving the April 11th gig to the Al Rosa bar in Columbus, which carries the unfortunate distinction of being the bar where Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell was shot and killed on stage.

The Decibel Magazine tour is the first headlining North American tour for Behemoth since Nergal’s recovery from lymphoma.

“Wow, big motherfuckin’ WOW! We are facing a legendary moment: Amerika, the land of the free, is banning Behemoth coz of religious beliefs,” said Nergal in a statement released today. “The madness starts in Ohio, but of korz we are playing anyway. Nothing can stop us now. God, please save me from this freedom.”

Okay, so his spelling isn’t the best (English isn’t his native tongue, if that matters), but you’ve got to love the bite in that last quote.

The Decibel Magazine tour comes through Vancouver on April 21st at Rickshaw before eventual stops in Toronto (May 8th at the Opera House), Montreal (May 9th at Club Soda) and Quebec City (May 10th at Imperial).