Grammy-winning producer Jack Antonoff says Ed Sheeran folded when he should have fought back. In a recent interview with The Guardian, Antonoff tore into Sheeran for dropping Macklemore from his Loop Tour after the rapper called for “Free Palestine” during his opening set in Philadelphia and elsewhere on the tour.
“If you think it is [controversial] you’re lost in some other sauce that is so crazy,” Antonoff said. “They’re going to let some f—ing promoter tell me what I can say? Don’t book me. I’ll play for free outside.”
The controversy traces back to a reported threat from a group of NFL team owners, including New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, who said they would bar Sheeran from performing in their stadiums if Macklemore stayed on the bill. Sheeran removed the rapper, then addressed the fallout during his own Philadelphia stop, saying: “What happened in Israel and at the Nova Music Festival on Oct. 7 was horrific and compounded centuries of Jewish pain. What is happening in Gaza is catastrophic and unjustifiable and disproportionate.”
Antonoff, who produces for Taylor Swift and fronts the band Bleachers, said Sheeran had the wrong play entirely.
“[Ed Sheeran] missed a massive, beautiful opportunity there: just cancel the whole f—ing tour, then play for free outside each venue, raise a bunch of money, rather than let a f—ing billionaire tell you what to do. The reason it’s not an anomaly or niche issue is because we all live in a world where billionaires are constantly telling us what to do. So stand the f— up.”
Sheeran wasn’t the only one to lose support acts over the decision. Finneas, Aaron Rowe and Lukas Graham all pulled out of the tour in solidarity with Macklemore, who responded by launching his own “Free Palestine Tour.” Antonoff, who is Jewish and has also spoken in favor of a free Palestine, praised Macklemore for not backing down, saying he’s “felt way more emboldened to say it now” and calling the statement “a deeply human thing to say,” not a controversial one.
Not everyone is buying Antonoff’s framing. Christian Toto, founder and editor of Hollywood in Toto, told Fox News Digital that Antonoff’s outrage is less about principle than industry positioning.
“Jack doesn’t sound well-informed, either about Middle East politics or his own business,” Toto said. “If Sheeran scrapped his tour, how many workers would lose their jobs? And, if he did an alternative tour, how would they get paid? He knows it’s acceptable within his industry to blanketly bash billionaires, a lazy, thoughtless attack and do a variation of ‘Free Palestine.’ He’s trying to curry favor within his industry. Sadly, it might just work.”
Fox News Digital reached out to both Sheeran and Macklemore for comment but had not received a response as of publication.
