Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters is urging Maroon 5, Travis Scott and Big Boi to “take a knee” during their halftime performance at this weekend’s Super Bowl.
“I call upon them to do it in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick, to do it for every child shot to death on these mean streets, to do it for every bereaved mother and father and brother and sister,” the 75-year-old rock icon said, in a statement.
Kaepernick is the former 49ers quarterback who sparked controversy in the NFL when he started going down on one knee during the U.S. national anthem to protest racial injustice and police brutality.
“So there you go my brothers, you are faced with a choice,” Water said. “I’m not saying it will be easy, all the President’s men, all the huffers and puffers, will be royally pissed off, but, $#@%’em, I call upon you to do it because it’s the right thing to do and because somewhere inside you know it.”
Waters said he also supports a change.org petition calling on Maroon 5 to drop out of the halftime show. As of Thursday night, more than 113,000 people added their name to the campaign.
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On Thursday’s episode of Entertainment Tonight, Maroon 5 frontman Adam Levine said: “I’m not in the right profession if I can’t handle a little bit of controversy. It’s what it is. We expected it. We’d like to move on from it.”
Levine said the band is focused on music. “I thought to myself, ‘What’s my greatest tool, what’s the thing that I can use to express myself and what’s the best way for the band to express themselves, and how are we going to do it this year? What do we owe ourselves? What do we owe the people?’ And that’s what we did.
“And I’m beyond proud of the finished product and literally, I’ve never been more excited in my entire life to present this to people because I believe that it’s truly a reflection of all of us.”
The Super Bowl airs Sunday on CTV.