THE Wolfe Tones singer Brian Warfield has said "people are allowed to have their heroes" amid the continuing controversy surrounding the band's Féile an Phobail gig.
The band frontman also said "we're entitled to our own song and culture" following criticism of pro-IRA chanting during their concert at the weekend.
Warfield also hit out at what he described as "crankiness in the DUP" for stirring up controversy over the gig.
It came after DUP assembly member Emma Little-Pengelly branded the concert a "hate fest" and said "public money cannot be used to fund an event which year after year spends hours glorifying the terrorism of the PIRA".
"Rather than moving Northern Ireland forward, this festival is dragging us backwards," she added.
But Warfield said the believed the "crankiness of the DUP is very hypocritical".
"I don't hear them cranking about the bonfires on the Shankill Road, or the Shankill butchers, or any of the things that happened in the loyalist areas," he told The Irish Mirror.
"Remember that people are allowed to have their heroes. One song out of the whole evening describes me walking through Glasgow and reading on the walls, the graffiti on the walls, Celtic are magic are magic, and graffiti on the wall I saw said 'Oh, ah, up the Ra'.
"Now if that happens to be their heroes, they might have a reason that it is their heroes. It's not because they hate somebody else. I haven't heard any hateful chants from the nationalist community. Once again, the cranks are out, they come out after every concert we do. This has happened to us since the 60s."
Féile director Kevin Gamble had said around 100,000 people attended the festival, which also meant that no internment bonfires were lit in the west of the city on August 8.
Read more:
Chris Donnelly: If loyalist tunes are okay then why not republican songs? (premium)
Patricia Mac Bride: Wolfe Tones are past their sell-by date but Kneecap is different (premium)
