Antemasque Frontman Throws Boiling Water At NZ Festival-Goers

Ex-At The Drive In and The Mars Volta frontman Cedric Bixler-Zavala is no stranger to stage controversies, his infamous "sheep" rant at the 2001 Big Day Out a prime example of his penchant for erratic, unpredictable behaviour while in front of a crowd.

Now, fans at New Zealand's Westfest — the Kiwi equivalent of Soundwave — have their own legend to spin after the singer, who now fronts rock outfit Antemasque, wore some apparent displeasure pretty heavily on his sleeve at Tuesday's event by way of chucking stage equipment all over the place and even hurling a kettle filled with "boiling hot" water into the crowd, splashing fans and leaving marks and, in at least one case, minor burns on those in attendance.

"My face and right arm were splashed; it looked like coffee," an anonymous festival-goer told Stuff.co.nz after the fact. "Since I was sweating, I got away without having any serious burns.

"Whenever the vocalist picked up an item, you never knew if it was going to land on you; it was quite on-edge. He actually threw his microphone at the crowd at the end but since it was on a cord it landed just off the stage."

However, fellow attendee Hugh Smith claimed he and his friends received "the full brunt" of the kettle's contents, telling the NZ Herald: "Cedric threw a plastic kettle full of boiling hot water towards me and my friends.

"We were standing about four-five metres back. I threw my hand up to catch it before it collided with my friend's face… this bruised my hand and then splashed hot water all over him and my face.

"It bloody hurt. My friend's arm went all burny pink."

Watch the footage below.

There still remains some contention over exactly how hot the water in the kettle was — one source told the NZ Herald that "it wasn't scalding hot, but it was hot", while another said the jug was filled with "recently boiled water" and that it appeared as though "some people got burnt as steam was coming off the water as it went through the air".

However, given the fact a punter was able to provide the paper with a picture allegedly showing the hot-water mark left on his arm following Bixler-Zavala's outburst, it's probably pretty safe to say that it was definitely resting somewhere well above "lukewarm", at any rate. 

Neither the band nor festival has commented on the incident.

Check out some more photos of the tantrum below.