Nine US Arenas Rejected Macklemore’s Free Palestine Tour, He Says, but MSG Says He’s “Not an Arena Level Act”

Macklemore says that nine of America’s biggest arenas have refused to host his Free Palestine tour, and that the dates he was offered vanished once venues learned the concerts would benefit Palestinians. Madison Square Garden has pushed back, saying the issue is availability and the rapper’s draw, not politics.

The claims came in a seven-slide Instagram post on 6 November. They follow a turbulent autumn for the artist, who was removed from Ed Sheeran’s US stadium tour and then staged a sold-out run in Europe.

Which venues does Macklemore say turned him down?

Macklemore named nine arenas: Madison Square Garden, Barclays Center, UBS Arena and the Prudential Center in the New York area; the Intuit Dome, Kia Forum and Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles; San Francisco’s Chase Center; and Seattle’s Climate Pledge Arena.

He said his team received available dates through the end of the year by mid-September. “But once they found out these were my benefit shows for Palestine, those dates were suddenly off the table,” he wrote. “The conversations were all different, but the result was the same.” He added that in more than 20 years of touring he had never experienced anything like it.

The Independent reported that all proceeds from the benefit shows go to organisations providing humanitarian relief, medical aid and advocacy for Palestinians.

What does Madison Square Garden say?

A spokesperson for MSG Entertainment gave Variety and The Hollywood Reporter the same statement: “We have some of the busiest venues in the world with extremely limited availability and he’s not an arena level act.” That is a direct rebuttal of the idea that the decision was political. Variety said it had contacted all nine venues, and The Hollywood Reporter said representatives for the other eight had not immediately responded. The sources contain no account from any other arena of why it declined, so Macklemore’s version of events is so far unconfirmed.

The “arena level” remark sits awkwardly beside the rapper’s recent results. According to the coverage, the Free Palestine tour sold out arenas in Dublin, Paris and London in late October. The Guardian’s Alexis Petridis called the London show “a triumph”, and the line-ups included Hozier and Kneecap, with appearances from actors Mark Ruffalo and Susan Sarandon.

How the Sheeran split led here

The benefit shows grew out of Macklemore’s removal from Ed Sheeran’s Loop tour. He had spoken in support of Palestinians, including the occupied West Bank, during an opening set at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. Sheeran said US venues had warned they would not host the shows if Macklemore stayed on the bill. “I am not complicit,” Sheeran said, adding that he has personal views on the conflict even though he chooses not to speak publicly.

The Hollywood Reporter says New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft and other NFL owners told Sheeran they would not host his concerts with Macklemore on the bill. Kraft defended the decision at the time, citing Macklemore’s stage remarks and what he called “a broader history of antisemitic rhetoric and imagery” that he said was offensive to the Jewish community. The sources do not include a response from Macklemore to that specific allegation, though his Instagram post frames his activism as solidarity with Palestinians and rooted in “love”.

After his removal, all four of the other opening acts and Sheeran’s live band quit the tour in solidarity with Macklemore.

A fight over who decides which causes are acceptable

Macklemore cast the alleged refusals as part of a wider pattern. “We’ve reached a point where a handful of billionaires can decide which causes are acceptable, which voices are welcome and which human lives are worth defending,” he wrote, adding: “Today it’s Palestine. What will it be tomorrow?” He also said he no longer cared about burning bridges with industry figures who do not support Palestinians.

He pointed to signs of a shifting political climate, citing the Democrats’ showing in this week’s midterms and Abdul El-Sayed’s Senate win in Michigan. In his telling, El-Sayed won on a platform that included ending the war in Gaza, despite heavy spending against him by groups such as AIPAC.

Where could the tour go next?

Macklemore says the US dates are not dead. “We’ll probably just take that shit outside where it belonged in the first place,” he wrote, promising “We will build our own stages.” That suggests open-air or non-traditional venues, though no dates or locations have been announced.

For now, the dispute comes down to competing explanations. Macklemore says the Free Palestine tour was shut out because of its cause. MSG says it is a matter of scarce dates and the size of his audience. Responses from the other eight arenas, if they come, will show whether the pattern he describes holds up.

Explore more on this topic with Vexel Search.

File photo: P2N2022Macklemore 1.jpg by Selbymay, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.