Ghost’s Tobias Forge believes that bands are only cancelling gigs because they are not satisfied with their earnings, not because of COVID: “That is a fucking horrible message to the crowd”

Swedish rock band Ghost are in high demand for gigs and play massive arenas. The band also had little to postpone or cancel between 2020 and 2021, having just completed a tour in March 2020.

Now, however, Ghost frontman Tobias Forge highlights in a recent episode of the Drinks With Johnny podcast the bands that have cancelled their tours due to the coronavirus. According to Forge, the reason is not because of concerns about people’s health or anything else, but purely because of dissatisfaction with tour earnings.

“Well, the problem now is that a lot of these bands find the bottom line not to be satisfactory. They don’t go out and say, ‘Look, we’re not making as much money as we wish, so we’re going to cancel or we’re going to postpone till the stars are aligned and the marketplace looks better.’

They go out and tell the crowd, ‘Oh, because of safety concerns we’re not touring,’ and that is a fucking horrible message to the crowd, to the rest of the business to everyone that we’re all relying on – as in all the promoters and everyone working at the venues, everybody working as vendors, all the crew members, all the bussing companies, all the truck companies, all these people who just had their tour cancelled just because these three, four or five dudes/girls just decided that the money wasn’t great.

And then they go out and tell ‘Oh, by the way, don’t even go to shows because it’s not safe.’”

When Forge was asked if he had heard of any bands directly telling fans not to attend gigs, Forge replied:

“No, it becomes that. That is what becomes. If one band decides to go and say like, ‘No, [it’s] because of safety, it’s not safe to tour because of COVID.’ Of course, you’re sending a message to the crowd that ‘Oh, maybe it’s not [safe]. And remember, we have cultivated this agoraphobia and this germaphobia now that is a big problem.

And it takes a lot of courage for a lot of people to go out. It takes a lot of courage for people to go to a show. And when one band goes out and says, ‘Oh, we’re not going to tour because of safety concerns, because the world is not a safe place because of COVID.’ It does say to the fan that ‘Oh, maybe that’s right. I shouldn’t even go out now.’ That is detrimental.”