Azealia Banks axed from Hackney music festival after racist rant at Zayn Malik
Azealia Banks. Photograph: Rick Bonetti via Flickr
Azealia Banks has been dropped from headlining a Hackney music festival after the hip hop artist unleashed a racially abusive and homophobic twitter tirade.
Banks was set to headline Rinse: Born & Bred festival in Haggerston Park on Sunday 5 June.
But Rinse FM, the festival organisers, have dropped the US star after she posted offensive tweets targeted at One Direction’s Zayn Malik.
In a statement, the festival organisers said: “We have decided to cancel Azealia Banks’ headline appearance … Rinse: Born & Bred Festival is a celebration of rave culture and has been created for everyone. We celebrate inclusivity and equality.”
ANNOUNCEMENT: @RinseFM I @bornandbredLDN pic.twitter.com/AB3wnTaSru
— Rinse I Born & Bred (@bornandbredLDN) May 11, 2016
In a stream of derogatory tweets, Banks called Malik a “brown-faced refugee” and said his whole family would be “obliterated by the good old U.S of A.”.
She added: “The UK really can’t rap though. UK RAP is just a disgrace to rap culture in general.”
The row started when 24-year-old Banks claimed Malik had copied her work for his new video, Like I Would.
Damn Zayn be mood boarding the fuck of out me 😳.. I’m not mad about this though. Zayn is a cutie pie
A photo posted by Azealia Banks (@azealiabanks) on
Banks added that she thought the singer was a “cutie pie”, but when Malik, a British singer with a Pakistani father and English-Irish mother, tweeted: “I see you reaching but I don’t care … My @’s too good for you,” Banks assumed it was aimed at her and unleashed a tirade of abuse, including the accusation that Malik was only in One Direction “to draw brown attention”.
Responding to the festival’s decision, Banks tweeted: “To all of my Darling UK fans who bought tickets to see me at the Rinse FM show. My sincerest apologies!!!!!
“But you know Mama Puma always goes in for the Kill. And NEVER backs down.”