End It vocalist Akil Godsey has broken his silence in the wake of this month’s banana man incident. The hardcore band have kept quiet since the footage of that now infamous concert made headlines during the first week of the month. During a June 05th, 2026 show opening for Terror, Godsey and other members of End It took issue with a concertgoer wearing a banana costume. Godsey went so far as to offer up the band’s setlist as a bounty to whoever would ‘strip the banana.’ He went on to say, “I’m just saying, he was asking for attention, now you got it.”
Members of the audience responded immediately, attempting to swarm the concertgoer and ultimately shredding his banana costume, tossing it around the audience. While footage has since been shared of End It taking issue with costumed individuals at their prior shows, it would appear that the fan in question at the Toronto stop was unaware of the band’s stance. Said concertgoer also had a documented history on his social media of attending various shows in banana costumes.
An interview conducted with ‘banana man’ in the aftermath of the Toronto show on the the Beardo & Weirdo podcast found him state that he wasn’t entirely familiar with End It and was in attendance that night to see Terror. The incident sparked intense debate and saw End It‘s Facebook page disappear and the band go missing in action from a planned European tour with Hatebreed and Life Of Agony.
Taking to his Instagram this morning, June 24th, Godsey released the below video statement to discuss the incident [transcribed by theprp.com]:
“The funniest thing to come out of all this is people telling me they were disappointed in me, when the first song I ever wrote for this band is called ‘Give Up‘, which is where I instruct people to walk into the woods to commit suicide. You’ve obviously not been listening to the band, and I don’t know what the fuck you thought was going on over here. We’re in a, we’re a hardcore band. We do hardcore things. You don’t have to come over here. You don’t have to pay attention to me at fucking all.
Everyone in my life loves me very much. I’m very well taken care of. I do not need your attention or validation. I’ll be just fine. Hey, if the band got to quit, so be it. I guess I’ll go to work. I’m a fully functioning adult male. I’ll be just fine. There’s more to life than whatever the fuck you think is going on over here. You don’t even know what’s going on over here. We haven’t spoken in ages. You’re living off of assumptions. Don’t assume, my parents taught me that. But have fun with the life you’ve made for yourself.”
Godsey further captioned his video, implying he has received racial slurs and death threats for the banana man incident. He stated of the below video, “Thanks for the racism and death threats and dissertations. It’s all been very taxing. I’m gonna go raise my child now. Peace.”
His new post has drawn support from a few notable artists. Aaron Heard (Jesus Piece), offered “Tabernacle.” Nails responded with “fuck all these pussies”. Thursday, etc. vocalist Geoff Rickly replied with “B.C.H.C.”, and shoegaze band Nothing replied with a church emoji.
