News:

‘Kill Gays’ Artist To Perform In 14 U.S. Cities

OutGayLife.com

Controversial Jamaican reggae artist Buju Banton’s U.S. tour includes 14 cities.

Last week, concert promoters LiveNation and AEG Live announced that they had canceled all of the scheduled concerts by Banton at company-owned House of Blues locations amid a furry of protest by gay rights groups.

Banton is known for his violent anti-gay lyrics. His 1992 hit Boom Bye Bye proposes pouring acid on gay men and shooting them in the head with a submachine gun.

Four House of Blues venues have been dropped from the tour. Appearances in San Francisco, at the Regency Ballroom, and Los Angeles, at Club Nokia, have also been scrapped.

The six canceled venues, however, represent only a fraction of the cities Banton will tour this fall.

Banton will first appear at the Trocadero in Philadelphia next Saturday. The show’s promotion was taken over by Jamaican Dave Productions after AEG Live dropped its support, gay weekly Philadelphia reported.Gay News

“We canceled the show, but the venue and the co-promoter came to an agreement to go ahead with it,” Michael Roth, spokesman for AEG Live, told the paper.

Banton is scheduled to appear at three reggae festivals this fall, including the Annual Reggae Fest at the Crossroads Nightclub in Bladensburg, Maryland on Sunday, September 13, the New Jersey Music Festival at the Riverfront Stadium in Newark, New Jersey on Sunday, September 20, and the Jam Rock Music Festival at the Westchester County Center in White Plains, New York on Sunday, September 27.

In his native Jamaica, where being gay is punishable by 10 years in prison, anti-gay violence is rife and typically tolerated by the authorities. In 2004, Banton was tried and acquitted on charges that he participated in the beating of six gay men.

Venues that will host Banton include the Lido Night Club in Revere, Massachusetts on Friday, September 18; the Water Street Music Hall in Rochester, New York on Saturday, September 19; The Nora in Norfolk, Virginia on Friday, September 25; The National in Richmond, Virginia on Saturday, September 26; the Majestic Theater in Detroit, Michigan on Wednesday, September 30; Annies in Cincinnati, Ohio on Friday, October 2; Lifestyles Communities Pavilion in Columbus, Ohio on Saturday, October 3; and First Avenue in Minneapolis, Minnesota on Sunday, October 4.

Banton is also still scheduled to appear at two large venues in the South.

In Atlanta, he will appear at the Center Stage Theater on Saturday, October 24. And a Sunday, November 1 concert at Hard Rock Live in Orlando, Florida will cap the tour.

Banton appearances in Chicago and San Francisco have drawn the loudest protests, lead by Chicago’s Gay Liberation Network. The group was behind the effort to close the House of Blues concerts.

[Via http://goaffirmations.wordpress.com]