Heavy metal icons Gwar staged a mock beheading of Elon Musk and murdered President Trump during their performance at this weekend’s Riot Fest, with critics slamming the band for “normalizing violence.”
Shocking video shows the chainsaw-wielding Musk mannequin, dressed in sunglasses, a baseball cap, a black “D.O.G.E.” t-shirt, matching black jeans and a jacket being decapitated by a member of the band mid-show at the Chicago rock festival.
To cheers from the crowd, the mannequin’s head comes flying off with a slice of the costumed band member’s sword, sending a jet of fake blood spurting into the air.
Gwar — founded in 1984 in Richmond, Virginia and sometimes stylized as GWAR — are well-known for their grotesque costumes and graphically violent stunts.
Previous shows from the band have featured fake blood, urine and semen being used to spray the audience.
But Saturday afternoon’s performance sparked an outcry from some after footage of the beheading of Musk went viral on social media.
“That’s not edgy, it’s grotesque and reckless and normalizes violence against a real person. This is not okay. Riot Fest and GWAR crossed a major line,” one X user wrote, reposting the video.
It wasn’t immediately clear if the user was being sincere or “rage-baiting” others with the post, as they changed their bio on X to “GWAR’s biggest fan.”
“F–k Elon Musk. Call the manager you f–king loser. It’s like you never heard of GWAR before you f–king p–y,” the X account for hacking group Anonymous wrote in response.
Another shared a video of a similar stunt the band carried out, beheading a model of former President Joe Biden at a previous show.
“Welcome to GWAR. They are from outer space. They once released an album called ‘We kill everything’ because they do in fact kill everything,” the X user wrote.
The same account that shared the original video of Musk also shared footage from the same show depicting an overweight model of Donald Trump violently bleeding out on stage.
Representatives for Gwar and Riot Fest didn’t respond immediately for comment.
Earlier, Riot Fest responded to the clip of the original Musk stunt writing, “Like I know this is a rage bait engagement farming Twitter account, but ‘GWAR crossed a major line’ is one of the funniest f–king things I’ve ever heard,” in response on X.
Not all fans were on side, however.
“Listen I know they do this to every leader and even did Obama but after what happened with Charlie Kirk last week it’s just r—-ded timing,” one user wrote, but their response got short shrift from Riot Fest.
“Shut the f–k [up] you dork a– loser,” came the reply.
Riot Fest, a three-day punk festival set up in 2005, is one of the largest independently-owned music festivals in the US.
This year’s event featured headline shows from Blink-182, Weezer and Green Day.
Read the full article here