BBC News report on Kneecap, January 2024

A clip from the BBC in January 2024 about the republican rap group Kneecap

Transcript

00:00 Kneecap and not without controversy. This mural showing a police Land Rover on fire

00:04 did upset some local politicians. But the band say they're about making music, not stirring

00:09 up tensions.

00:10 You had the song 'Get Your Brits Out' which has nothing to do with a mass exodus of British

00:18 people from the north of Ireland or anything like that there.

00:20 Which people like to believe.

00:21 You see this kind of aesthetic as well where people are wearing tracksuits and the kind

00:26 of clothes you wear, it's associated with a type of scumbaggery and people just have

00:30 that image.

00:31 I don't think it's the clothes you're wearing, I think it's the balaclava you're wearing.

00:32 I was just about to say that as well.

00:33 I don't know, I was worried about your Adidas coat.

00:34 With the balaclava as well. People look at this and say, think it's a kind of sectarian

00:39 statement or something.

00:40 I know, I don't know a word of that.

00:41 It's the opposite.

00:42 Their name is derived from so-called kneecapping, where people are shot in the legs by paramilitaries.

00:51 But kneecaps say their name isn't a celebration of violence.

00:54 We're glad that there's peace right now, we're not trying to stoke any fires and we're all

00:59 the same people.

01:00 Do you know what I mean?

01:01 And the pioneers in Irish rap gave me a language lesson before I left.

01:06 Táimhúid in seo am El Fáirste.

01:08 Táimhúid in seo am El Fáirste.

01:11 Le kneecap an nío.

01:12 Le kneecap an nío.

01:13 Thank you guys.

01:14 No problem.

01:15 Well thank you in Irish.

01:16 Go raibh maith agat.

01:17 It's not easy.

01:18 That was I'm here with kneecap today in Belfast.

01:21 Apologies about the pronunciation.

01:22 Charlotte Gallagher, BBC News.

01:24 - I think so.

01:25 - Brace yourselves.