Detroit Club Owners Face Serious Backlash After Hosting a Nazi Black Metal Band

Oh boy, ain’t this some shit? In an era where literal Nazis are marching on American streets and a South African robber baron is doing Nazi salutes from behind the Presidential podium, it truly was only a matter of time before we’d get our first Nazi metal story of 2025.

That story involves the long-running Detroit venue Harpos Concert Theater and this past Saturday’s black metal concert in which Nazi black metal band Grand Belial’s Key was slated to perform. However, the night’s proceedings ultimately were cut short after locals voiced their outrage that bands with neo-Nazi ties would get to perform there.

And now in the immediate aftermath, the venue’s owners Krystle Dzajkovska and Ruzvelt Stevanovski are trying to save face and minimize damage by releasing a statement where they claim they weren’t given details about the concert or who would be performing prior to Saturday night.

“We were not given certain information during the process of booking this event that could have prevented this from happening. After reflection on our end, we realize that although we should have asked for more and done more research, we feel that by design, they deliberately failed to provide such information. We feel manipulated throughout the entire process and will continue to address where we need to improve.

“For the event held on Saturday January 25th, we were not made aware ahead of time that some of the bands were in any association with Nazi/Neo Nazi, White Supremacy, and/or Nationalist Socialist black metal. If I were made aware of this ahead of time, this event would have never happened. This was the first time this event organizer has done an event at our venue. In the process of the event organizer booking this event with Harpos, this information was never given. It was communicated that it was just a Black Metal Festival, which Harpos has had many in the past.”

Anyone else think it’s absolutely fucking crazy that a venue owner wouldn’t demand more information before allowing any sort of event to take place in their building? I mean, your venue is your livelihood, so why would you run the risk of anything fucking that up? Sounds a little crazy, but let’s keep going.

According to a report by local ABC affiliate WXYZ Detroit, the show’s promoter said they would promote the event themselves and asked Stevanovski to not post about it online at all. Red flag. Then, when the promoter began posting fliers for the show, they announced that the show’s location would only be revealed to people that bought tickets. Again… red fucking flag.

But apparently the lack of any details and the fishy requests by the promoter didn’t trigger any warning signs for Stevanovski. It’s not like he’s been the owner and operator of various Detroit nightclubs and venues since 1981 or anything… Except we knew he thought something was amiss because he told WXYZ Detroit that it was “kind of a red flag to me, but I didn’t think too much of it.” Nice.

Still, the event went on and bands began playing. However, according to the statement released by Dzajkovska and Stevanovski, they only learned that something was amiss about the show once calls began coming into the venue and online posts were made by outraged individuals. At the same time, police were receiving threats about the concert and responded to Harpos along with Detroit’s fire marshal during the second band’s set.

It was only then, according to Fox 2 Detroit, that Stevanovski took to the stage and shut things down, causing the roughly 250 concertgoers to leave the venue. In addition to the ol’ Nazi kerfuffle, the Detroit Fire Department slapped the venue with 24 safety violations, which DFD Fire Marshall Don Thomas outlined in a statement:

“Upon arrival at the business in question, the fire marshal division noted multiple egregious life and fire safety violations, including padlocked doors, blocked exits, and no emergency lighting. This is unacceptable. A total of 24 violations were written by the Detroit Fire Department.”

Holy Great White, Batman! Stevanovski claims that he had all the appropriate licenses to operate the venue, but that he didn’t have them on hand to show the authorities. As for the violations from the Detroid Fire Department, those are going to have to be addressed before Harpos can get a valid business license and reopen its doors.

Still, the owners say this whole thing was a mistake and said this wasn’t what they or the venue stand for.

“Although this event was not booked by Harpos and was booked by an outside event organizer, I am still the owner of the venue and I take full responsibility and accountability for not doing my due diligence. I foolishly did not follow up as intensely as I should have. This is not who we are or what we represent. As a Black venue owner, I fully understand that hate and racism comes in all forms and skin tones. However, my race/ethnicity is no defense or excuse for my ignorance of not knowing. Since we took ownership in 2017, I have always been devoted to promoting inclusion of all nationalities at Harpos and would never intentionally jeopardize the trust that I’ve earned with the community. I intend on doing everything I can to gain back that trust. Harpos has a rich history and I now realize I need to do more to address concerns about vetting bands and doing more research. I have an immense amount of improvement to do and I need to do better for the sake of my business and my community.

“The outrage and anger is completely understood and shows that there is still some humanity left in this world and that there are still individuals out there that will stand up against what is wrong and hateful.

“Hate and racism is not something that I or Harpos stand for, encourage, or promote and I would never knowingly or intentionally hold this type of event at my venue with the risk of losing the support of my community and my venue. This is not who we are, this is not what we represent.”

In the wake of all this going down, Harpos has locked down their entire social media presence by closing the comment sections of all their posts.

Good on everyone that blew this event up and brought it to light. There’s no room for Nazis anywhere, let alone in metal. Fuck that.