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Boy George has threatened to fire members of his band who don’t want to perform his pro-Israel song, We Will Dance Again.
In an Instagram video he uploaded on Sunday, he spoke about the artificial intelligence he used to make the song, and claimed that ‘any musician’ would have got in his way during the creative process.
The song, posted by the Culture Club singer, real name George Alan O’Dowd, on social media last month, includes the lyrics: ‘You say genocide, I say war’.
It makes reference to the attack at the Nova music festival, where O-Dowd, 65, writes people were ‘murdered brutally for the crime of dancing’.
Around 1,200 people died during the October 7 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel. Since the war began, the Palestinian death toll has surpassed 73,000.
Speaking in a recent Instagram post, O’Dowd said: ‘Even now the song is written, there are people in my band who are questioning whether they’ll perform it with me. And those people will be fired.’
He continued: ‘I don’t need gatekeepers, and one of the great things about AI is that it removes all the interference, all the human interference.
Maintaining that he wrote the song, O’Dowd stressed: ‘The lyrics are mine, the melody is mine.’
He claimed the use of AI makes him ‘more creative’.
The singer added: ‘That’s what I do with Culture Club that’s what I do with all the people I work with because I don’t play an instrument.
‘That doesn’t make me lazy or make me uncreative. In fact I think AI has made me more creative.’
Following on from backlash over the song, the musician’s management announced that he would not be making his West End return to play King Herod at the London Palladium from August 3-15 as originally planned.
About his decision to pull out of Jesus Christ Superstar, he began in a social media post: ‘Sometimes, I realise that being an air sign I expect the world to understand me without having to explain myself.
‘The suggestion that I feel no compassion for Palestinians is both untrue and absurd.
‘I am devastated for the loss of the innocent lives on both sides of this war and I call for peace.’
He went on to call out people branding him a ‘genocide denier’ while ‘those who deny the suffering of Israelis are given a free pass’.
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George said his now-controversial song had been inspired by his visit to the Nova Exhibition and meetings with families and survivors.
‘My song is pro peace and about the emotions I felt after visiting the Nova Exhibition and talking to Michael and Lisa Marlowe who had their son Jake taken from them. Murdered trying help others.
‘I also spent time talking to May Hayat who survived while her best friend was murdered. We took a picture standing in front all the people who were killed that day.
‘Everyone knows what happened to innocent women, kids, babies, sons and fathers on that day, innocent people who were at a festival celebrating life.’
Earlier this year, O’Dowd claimed he had no opinion on Israel; however, on July 28, he released the song.
‘You say genocide, I say war / When you’re attacked, that’s what the army’s for / Does it get ugly? You bet it does / When I know you wanna kill every last one of us,’ he sings in the song’s opening.
The song also criticises the pro-Palestinian movement, as well as musicians critical of Israel.
‘You condemn the Jews, with selective memory / Musicians holding flags, mouthing like sheep / Propaganda fuelled by the internet feels so weak,’ he sings.