Country music star Brantley Gilbert has announced that he will be selling “I Believe in Heroism” t-shirts at his upcoming show at the Ascend Amphitheater with the Nashville Symphony on May 4th. The shirt features an image of James Shaw Jr. ‘s bandaged hand and a patriotic design. Proceeds from the sale of the shirt will go to benefit the heroes and victims of the Waffle House shooting, which took place on Sunday, April 22nd.
“I’m a believer that bad people do bad things,” the country star shared during a press conference. “And I hope that if I can’t be around and something like that does happen (in my son’s life), I hope somebody like James or (his friend) Brennan is around. I feel like that’s what we’ve got right now is hope, and prayer has always gone a long way for me. At the end of the day, you just hope you’ve got heroes.”
“When you see someone like James, who just jumped up and did what he did — and you think about the lives he saved, you realize what a special kind of guy he is,” he added.
Shaw, 29, heroically disarmed the gunman who killed four people at a Tennessee Waffle House by grabbing the barrel of the gun.
“When you think of a hero, you think of Batman or Superman or something like that, or Wonder Woman or somebody like that, and they’re fictional characters,” Shaw explained during the event. “But if I say that a regular guy took a gun from somebody, I hope you can find that same fire within yourself, that you can possibly emulate that, and that anybody can be a hero.”
Brantley added his own take on the situation.
“I know he says he’s not a hero, but I kinda told him, ‘Hey man. You did what you did. You got hero in you for sure,'” Gilbert said. “…In [an] extraordinary case like this… that’s all heart and soul. That’s probably a little bit of instinct and a lot of heart.”
Besides being offered at Gilbert’s upcoming show, the t-shirts are also available online here. Indie band Dashboard Confessional will also be selling the shirts at their Ryman Auditorium show on May 11th.
Be sure to share this news with other country music fans and let’s help make a difference!
