The band has apologised after asking the Russian fan to play drums for a song last night.
ADVERTISEMENTBrandon Flowers, lead singer of American indie band The Killers, brought a Russian fan on-stage to play the drums for their song ‘For Reasons Unknown’ at the Black Sea Arena in Batumi, a city in Georgia.
“We don’t know the etiquette of this land but this guy’s a Russian. You okay with a Russian coming up here?” Flowers asked. The crowd then reportedly erupted in boos with some Georgian fans leaving the event entirely.
In response to the boos, Flowers said: “You can’t recognise if someone’s your brother? He’s not your brother? We all separate on the borders of our countries? … Am I not your brother, being from America?”
Georgia gained independence from Russia in 1991 after the dissolution of the USSR. Following their independence, the country took a pro-EU and NATO stance. In 2008, Russia invaded Georgia resulting in the Russo-Georgian War.
To this day, Russia continues to occupy the disputed regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in Georgia. In 2021, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Russia maintained “direct control” of these regions and was responsible for human rights abuses there.
The Russo-Georgian War pre-dated Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine in 2014 and the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War that began in 2022.
In a Twitter post, The Killers have responded to criticism.
“Good people of Georgia, it was never our intention to offend anyone!” the post reads.
“We have a longstanding tradition of inviting people to play drums and it seemed from the stage that the initial response from the crowd indicated that they were okay with tonight's audience participation member coming onstage with us.”
"We recognise that a comment, meant to suggest that all of the Killers' audience and fans are ‘brothers and sisters,’ could be misconstrued. We did not mean to upset anyone and we apologise. We stand with you and hope to return soon.”
