I'm sure it's been a very unpleasant 24 hours for Five Finger Death Punch's management. Yesterday, footage surfaced from the band's gig in Tilburg, which showed Ivan Moody telling the crowd from the stage that it was his last performance with the band. This morning, guitarist Zoltan Bathory noted that what we saw wasn't some publicity stunt, and new footage corroborates his tweet.
Based on reports we've seen, the band went on without Moody last night and had former Divine Heresy vocalist Tommy Vext fill in for two songs. Moody then arrived and made his presence felt, as seen in the clip below. Here's the transcription:
“I wanna take a minute. Everybody has all these rumors about me, guess what? I was a little bit late, I’m sorry. But there is no other singer for Five Finger Death Punch. You guys wanna show em why? Then let’s wash it all away.”
ThePRP reports that later in the show, Moody once again referenced Vext:
“Here’s the deal. Somebody lied to me tonight. Where’s Tommy at? He was not supposed to be onstage. I love this guy, I really do. So, this next song is all you.” Moody then exited the stage with Vext publicly questioning which song he was about to perform (it turned out to be the band’s cover of “Bad Company“.)
After, Moody returned and that's when he said this would be his last show with the band saying “You guys wanna help me sing a song? Because I’ll let you know ahead of time. This is my last show with Five Finger Death Punch.”
Shortly after that, Moody panders to the crowd, asking “Can I ask you guys something? Do you want this to be my last show with Five Finger Death Punch?” At this point, you can see guitarist Jason Hook giving the crowd a thumbs down, followed by Moody making a face and doing the traditional jerk-off hand signal directed at Hook.
Here you can see Hook throw his guitar down in disgust:
Despite all of this, the band vows to move forward with their European tour, including a show in Austria tomorrow. They posted this comment:
Those who have followed 5FDP from the beginning can tell you there has always been an element of danger and unpredictability in our music and in our shows. That’s Rock ‘n’ Roll. When you do over 150 shows in a year, you will inevitably have a few derailments, but the train always keeps on moving. Last night in Tilburg was one of those instances, but as they say, you aren’t a race car driver if you don’t wreck a car or two.
We can’t wait to put on amazing shows tomorrow night at Nova Rock all the way to our just announced winter tour all over Europe. See you all on the race track….bring a helmet….
Five Finger Death Punch
The element of danger line is pretty rich. You'll notice there is no mention of if Moody would be present with the band at their show tomorrow. It's unknown if he's coming back.
