Joey Bada$$, YG, Mac Miller & More Concerts Canceled After Last Week’s Irving Plaza Shooting
Joey Bada$$' scheduled performance at Irving Plaza on Thursday night has been canceled, and in a since-deleted tweet, the rapper said the NYPD is behind the cancelation.
UPDATE: Live Nation has canceled or postponed six New York shows in all, including YG, Mac Miller and Vince Staples, as well as Joey Bada$$’.
“In light of last week’s tragic event, we are acting with an overabundance of caution and coordinating a going forward strategy with the New York Police Department that may also include a curfew,” a spokesperson for Irving Plaza and Gramercy Theatre told Rolling Stone. “Because these discussions with New York Police Department are ongoing, we will be postponing a few of our upcoming shows.”
The full list of canceled or rescheduled shows are as follows. At Irving Plaza: Joey Bada$$ (Thursday), Mac Miller (Friday) and Vince Staples (Saturday). At Gramercy: Guns N’ Roses cover band Appetite for Destruction (Friday), Black Pistol Fire (Saturday) and YG (Monday).
PREVIOUSLY: Joey Bada$$‘ scheduled performance at Irving Plaza on Thursday night has been canceled, and in a since-deleted tweet, the rapper said the NYPD is behind the cancelation.
One Fatality, Three Injured in Shooting at T.I. Concert in New York
The cancelation follows a shooting at the Manhattan venue May 25 during an event that was supposed to be headlined by T.I., in which one person was killed and three were injured.
Joey’s show was set to be part of Governors Ball’s After Dark concert series, taking place at venues throughout the city this weekend. Mac Miller (Friday) and Vince Staples (Saturday) are also scheduled to perform at the venue this weekend as part of the same program; as of press time, it was unclear whether those shows will still happen. According to Irving Plaza’s Twitter account, Wednesday night’s performance by Train is still set to take place. There are four additional hip-hop shows on Irving’s calendar throughout the month of June.
Reps for the NYPD did not respond to requests for comment on the cancelation. [Update (4:45 p.m.): After the publication of this story, a rep from the NYPD contacted Billboard to deny that it was behind the cancelation, directing questions to the venue and its owner, Live Nation. “The organization’s decision to cancel the event was in no way influenced by the NYPD,” officer Sophia Mason said in an email. Live Nation has not responded to requests for comment.]
Brooklyn rapper Troy Ave has been arrested and charged with attempted murder following the shooting last week at Irving, after which NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton decried hip-hop as a whole. “The crazy world of the so-called rap artists who are basically thugs that basically celebrate the violence they’ve lived all their lives and unfortunately that violence often manifests itself during the performances and that’s exactly what happened last evening,” Bratton said in a radio interview the morning of May 26.
Reps for Live Nation, which owns Irving Plaza, also did not respond to requests for comment as of press time.
More From Pro