‘Overwhelming support’ for Dolly Mavies after JD Vance walkout

“It was quite a small action but it had a really big ripple effect.”

Dolly Mavies found herself at the centre of worldwide media attention when she pulled out of a gig after a tip-off US Vice-President JD Vance could be attending.

The folk-rock singer-songwriter and her band chose to leave the venue in Daylesford, near Kingham, and she says she was inundated with supportive messages and received a big boost in social media followers after news of their decision spread across the globe.

Someone familiar with the vice-president’s plans has told the BBC he did not attend the gig, and had never planned to, though it has been widely reported that he was at the venue that day.

The north Oxfordshire musician, whose real name is Molly Davies, says she and her band were “suspicious” when they turned up at the venue, situated in a farm shop and there was a “lot of security around, which there isn’t normally, and then a huge convoy of police motorbikes and very big cars”.

Afterwards Molly posted a short video about her experience online, and “shared it with a few followers and people we know, and then it went into the news, and made its way all the way to the White House”.

Molly says this exposure led to her receiving “wonderful comments and support from people all across the world”.

She adds: “Obviously there’s an overwhelming sense of support in America… I think for a lot of American people there’s a lot of uncertainty, and a lot of people are scared, and it was amazing to feel like they’d been heard.”

Molly also received some comments accusing her of a PR stunt.

“We definitely didn’t do that at all,” she says. “If we were that clever we would have done something before now.”

Molly, who released her debut album The Calm & The Storm last year, says though she received criticism for her actions, “nobody’s ever going to agree with everybody, and that’s totally fine”.

“It riled some people up and that’s for them to decide… but I do think it’s really interesting because in the grand scheme of things we just chose not to do something.

“We could’ve done something much more extravagant… leaving is the most peaceful way of protest in some way.”