Queen are in another confrontation with the campaign of U.S. President Donald Trump, which recently used the band’s 1997 hit song “We Will Rock You,” for a campaign ad on the TikTok rival app Triller. According to the BBC the band faces an “uphill battle” against the app and campaign ad, which is still up on the platform.
The band’s management states that the group “continues to oppose and try to block usage of their songs” on the platform, however the ad remains up two days after its posting and nearly has a million views. As of press time Triller has not released a comment regarding the video.
Multiple artists such as The Rolling Stones, Neil Young, Guns N’ Roses’ Axl Rose, The Village People’s Victor Willis, heavy metal pioneer Ozzy Osbourne and the estates of Tom Petty and Prince have called out the administration for playing their music at campaign rallies. Many of these artists and others have joined with the Artists Rights Alliance to demand that candidates seek out the musician’s consent before playing their music at campaign rallies.
The confrontation between the group and the Trump campaign goes back to at least 2016, when Trump walked on stage at the RNC backed by “We Will Rock You.” “We are frustrated by the repeated unauthorised use of the song after a previous request to desist, which has obviously been ignored by Mr Trump and his campaign,” the group reportedly stated at the time.
The group levied another complaint last year when the song was used for a campaign ad posted on Twitter. This ad was eventually removed.
Leave a Comment