Bob Vylan: Radar Festival says it was forced to drop controversial act - or see entire day cancelled

• Several more festivals have removed Bob Vylan from their line-ups in the wake of their performance at Glastonbury.
• A UK festival has said it was put in a lose-lose situation if the band were to continue to perform - facing an entire day being cancelled.
• Radar Festival’s co-organiser Catherine Jackson-Smith spoke to podcasters this morning about the reasons for dropping the band, telling them it was beyond the festival’s control.

The fallout from Bob Vylan’s Glastonbury Festival set continues, as Manchester’s Radar Festival has dropped the group from their bill ahead of this weekend’s event.

An announcement was made earlier this week by the festival organisers, simply stating that Bob Vylan would no longer be part of the festival. It prompted fans to complain and call for ticket refunds due to the eleventh-hour change.

But in an interview with podcast 2 Promoters 1 Pod, one of the organisers has now explained the reasons behind the band’s removal, telling the podcast the decision was beyond their control - and an entire day of the festival would have been cancelled if Bob Vylan were due to perform.

Co-organiser Catherine Jackson-Smith said that the venue involved, the O2 Victoria Warehouse, was supportive of the band remaining on the bill.

However, she claims a call was made by authorities that the band would either need to be removed, or the festival would be cancelled on Saturday, the day Bob Vylan were due to headline.

“We’ve only communicated with the venue,” she told the podcast.

“So the venue has had to be a middleman in some capacity with forces above their heads. As someone that owns a venue, I completely sympathise and understand the principle [...] that come Monday morning, they still have to have an income. They can’t have their licence revoked or themselves shut down or police issues.”

Jackson-Smith stressed she wanted Bob Vylan to perform at the festival, but had “one of the most horrendous professional discussions” regarding the removal of the band.

She added: “We could continue with Bob Vylan as our headliner. If we continued with Bob Vylan as our headliner, we wouldn't have the festival happening on Saturday.”

She added: “We've got 41 other bands that are travelling here. They've all paid for flights, Underoath are travelling from America for this gig. I didn't want to phone up Underoath and say ‘hey guys, never mind’. Financially, that puts us in an incredibly precarious situation.”

The discussion came hours before the BBC announced they would drop ‘high-risk’ live performances like the ones undertaken by Bob Vylan and Kneecap, with the corporation stating that any musical performances deemed to be high risk would now not be broadcast live or streamed live.

You can listen to the entire interview with Catherine Jackson-Smith on the 2 Promoters 1 Pod YouTube channel from today.