It was eventful evening in Melbourne on Tuesday night at Brian Jonestown Massacre’s gig – well, half-gig.
The rock band, who formed in 1990, were on their ninth of 12 planned shows in Australia and New Zealand when all hell broke lose – and not in a fun rock n’ roll way, either.
The chaos came in the form of a physical fight between frontman and group founder Anton Newcombe and guitarist Ryan Van Kriedt.
Yep, in the immortal words of Bridget Jones’ friend Tom before that iconic Mark Darcy and Daniel Cleaver restaurant brawl: ‘It’s a fight, a real fight!’
In all seriousness though, they really did appear to go for each other in what is some very awkward watching for the totally confused crowd.
The build up of tension is somewhat of a mystery, but fans have filled some gaps in the jigsaw puzzle with their various videos of the evening, posted on X as the conflict heated up.
It appears the pair got into a disagreement as Kreidt can be heard telling the frontman: ‘For the 1,000 time, I’m not on your side, you’re on the wrong side.’
Footage then shows Newcombe telling Kriedt: ‘Cut off this guy’s mic, put down my guitar, party’s over captain.
‘We actually don’t need you. Go. Put my guitar down on the stage and think about what’s happening.’
Kriedt then hit back, saying, ‘You better think about this one, man. Because this is forever,’ before putting his guitar down and walking offstage.
But it wasn’t a totally seamless exit, as after a little bit of contact between the bickering bandmates one thing led to another and they were suddenly at each other.
It all got quite extreme when Newcombe hit Kriedt over the head with a guitar, and they dragged each other to the ground before security managed to separate them.
According to Rolling Stone, the curtain eventually fell and the show ended.
ABC report that prior to the bandmate’s argument, Newcombe was ‘unhappy and angry’ at the crowd, and the publication claims that the rest of the tour is cancelled.
Indeed, one video does show the frontman rocker calling his fans ‘the cancer you are’ in an unclear rant, while shining a torch into the crowd.
That’s one way to get your fans onside…
Metro.co.uk has reached out to Brian Jonestown Massacre for comment.
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