This file photo taken on February 16, 2016 shows Jesse Hughes, the singer of US rock group Eagles of Death Metal, holds a tee-shirt prior to the start of the concert at the Olympia concert hall in Paris, on February 16, 2016. On November 13, 2015 a series of coordinated attacks by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris killed at least 128 people in scenes of carnage at the Bataclan, restaurants and the national stadium. AFP
PARIS, France — Members of Eagles of Death Metal (EODM), the US group who were playing when jihadists attacked Paris’ Bataclan concert hall last year, were turned away from the venue’s reopening show Saturday over controversial remarks by their lead singer.
“They came, I threw them out — there are things you can’t forgive,” Bataclan co-director Jules Frutos told AFP, as Sting was wrapping up an emotional reopening show to mark a year since 90 people were massacred there during a gig by the Californian band.
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Eagles frontman Jesse Hughes — one of the two band members denied entry to the Sting concert — caused dismay in France earlier this year by suggesting Muslim staff at the Bataclan were involved in the gun and suicide bomb attack there on November 13, 2015.
Before the concert Frutos said that he was sick of listening to Hughes’ conspiracy theories.
“He makes these incredibly false declarations every two months. It is madness, accusing our security of being complicit with the terrorists… Enough. Zero. This has to stop,” he added.
Hughes, a rare right-wing rocker and supporter of US president-elect Donald Trump, has also said without evidence that Muslims were celebrating outside the venue during the siege.
The claims tarnished the band’s image and enraged the Bataclan’s managers, who strongly rejected the charges.
“He makes these incredibly false declarations every two months. It is madness, accusing our security of being complicit with the terrorists… Enough. Zero. This has to stop,” he added.
Invitations for EODM to play a number of French summer music festivals were also swiftly withdrawn.
Before he made the claims, Hughes told AFP that he wanted to be the first to play the Bataclan.
Hughes and his band have returned to Paris twice since the attack, to share the stage with U2 in December and to play the Olympia concert hall in February in front of many of the survivors.
The singer will be present outside the concert hall on Sunday for the unveiling of a plaque to the victims of the attack by French President Francois Hollande and Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo.
The Bataclan bloodbath was one of a series of gun and suicide bomb attacks across the French capital that night that left 130 people dead. CBB