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Papa Roach Concert Reportedly Used Stolen Video Game Artwork for a Poster
Papa Roach, the nu-metal band known for their hit song “Last Resort,” is accused of using stolen art from a video game for one of its tour posters without the permission from the developers.Papa Roach’s official Facebook page posted a picture of a tour poster used to promote the band’s recent performance at the South Side Ballroom in Dallas, Texas. The poster features a reddish fish monster looking at her phone with Papa roach and opener Asking Alexandria’s name on the front. The name of the venue is also printed along the bottom.
The only problem is that the poster isn’t an original work made for Papa Roach’s “Who Do You Trust?” U.S.A. tour. Instead, as noted by Twitter user Vlad Calu, the poster appears to be lifted and slightly edited from an official poster for the game Monster Prom by artist Ástor Alexander for the website, The Yetee.
Monster Prom is a 2018 visual novel developed by Beautiful Glitch. Styled after Japanese dating sims, Monster Prom lets players romantically pursue six different monsters to date.
Monster Prom creative director, Julián Quijano, spoke with Kotaku about the poster incident and said that while the incident provided, “some good laughs, silly puns and a funny story to tell,” art theft is sadly incredibly common in the entertainment industry.
It’s unclear how Alexander’s poster went on to be used for a Papa Roach tour poster. IGN reached out to Papa Roach’s agent for an explanation but didn't receive a response.
A closer look at Papa Roach’s Facebook post, which is still up on the band’s Facebook page, shows the poster is actually a screen capture from an Instagram story posted by the South Side Ballroom music venue. IGN also reached out to South Side Ballroom to ask if this poster was created by the venue for the tour, but have yet to hear back.
Papa Roach's concert in Dallas was held on July 27, and their next concert will be in Atlanta, Georgia. There's been no reports of Papa Roach reusing this poster for other shows on tour; nor have there been other reported instances of video game art being used for their tour posters.
Matt Kim is a reporter for IGN. You can reach him on Twitter.