Can you compartmentalise the music from the artist? (Read 1,661 times)

[coconutstall]

In light of the horrifying news about Tom Meighan of Kasabian, this is a topic I have been thinking a lot about recently. Are most of you able to compartmentalise the music from the artist? This isn't just about Kasabian, but for example Michael Jackson a lot of people I know say 'I can't listen to him anymore' but I've never really had this problem with any artist that I like.

I was going to put a 'depends on the situation' option in but figured everyone would go for that so I want to hear what you guys think.

[Jessica]

I'm in the middle. It matters, and it won't feel as good listening to Kasabian after knowing what Tom did and having that in the back of my mind, but it doesn't mean the music itself is any less good. I am in the crowd of people who haven't followed them since Velociraptor though and I rarely listen to them now, not sure how I would react if I was expecting a new album within the month or whatever.

[morning_rain]

Most artists through history have been horrible people. Not only musicians: Picasso used to beat his lovers (most of them underage), beat and burn his wife with cigarrettes, and was verbaly abusing to the point two of his lovers commited suicide. But he's not the only one: Jackson Polock, Salvador Dalí, Bukowski, Kerouac.

My point is: Even though we all despise those actions, we have to separate the art from the artist or sadly we'll miss a lot of great art.

And if we're talking about musicians it gets trickier, because if you stop listening to Kasabian for example you're not "punishing" just Tom, you're punishing the rest of the band who helped creating those songs, the crew, music venues...

Edit: I voted for the option "Yes - It doesn't matter to me what the artist has done in their personal lives" but it isn't acurate, it DOES matter, it's just that I try to focus on the art.

[Elie De Beaufour 🐴]

Are we talking something like Varg Vilkernees bad though? Varg burnt churches and killed a band mate. Now is a full blood Nazi.

[mancraider]

It doesn't matter to me as long as the music isn't a glorification of the nasty things they have done. In which case I wouldn't listen to it anyway regardless of the person's actions.

Many beautiful songs about love and peace have been written by awful people.

[The Escapist]

I think we all can, to some extent. Not many people would turn down a Caravaggio, despite him murdering a man in 1606. It's just where you personally tend to draw the line. I think for me, proven pedophilia is what I just can't overcome. I can enjoy The Beatles while knowing what a bastard Lennon was, I can enjoy The Smiths while knowing what a twat Morrissey would later become, but I couldn't even try to enjoy The LostProhets while knowing what Ian Watkins did. But then as another user said, Picasso also abused children, but some of his paintings are among my favourites. I think everyone has a line, but it's a wibbly-wobbly one that depends on the type of art, when it was produced, the culture it was produced in, and a million other things.

Another point is that I always found it weird who the industry/public chooses which pop-culture figures deify and who to demonise. The Gallaghers are known as the biggest knobheads in rock music, but I'm still waiting on Pete Townshend's child-porn book he was so thoroughly researching. You couldn't find a more deified music figure than Elvis, but don't forget that his favourite type of girls were the 14-year-old ones. Chuck Berry videotaped women in toilets, Eric Clapton was an avowed racist, and the best argument to prove that David Bowie wasn't raping 14-year-old Lori Mattox is that Jimmy Page was busy doing it at the time. And yet none of these people have a cultural perception that stops people enjoying them. Bring up the Gallaghers, though, and it's "God, but aren't those guys real jackasses?".

[joladella]

I voted yes, but for me it also depends, just with the current example of Kasabian, I look into myself and decide case by case how to deal with that.
There are a few red lines for me, abuse of children, rape, murder. Those people are dead for me. I had one of these, not in music, one of my favorite writers, after her death, turned out to be involved in horrible deeds, so all her books, some of them I deeply loved, went into the bin.

[Jessica]

Jul 9, 2020 9:34:23 GMT -5 The Escapist said:

Another point is that I always found it weird who the industry/public chooses which pop-culture figures deify and who to demonise. The Gallaghers are known as the biggest knobheads in rock music, but I'm still waiting on Pete Townshend's child-porn book he was so thoroughly researching. You couldn't find a more deified music figure than Elvis, but don't forget that his favourite type of girls were the 14-year-old ones. Chuck Berry videotaped women in toilets, Eric Clapton was an avowed racist, and the best argument to prove that David Bowie wasn't raping 14-year-old Lori Mattox is that Jimmy Page was busy doing it at the time. And yet none of these people have a cultural perception that stops people enjoying them. Bring up the Gallaghers, though, and it's "God, but aren't those guys real jackasses?".

A lot of those people don't like the music to begin with though because they're fans of the others and they think they ripoff those people too much. It doesn't help that Noel and Liam are still fighting either.

The other problem with just boycotting the music is that the problem doesn't just magically go away. It just gets replaced with another person who's going to be found doing the same thing. There's a lot of people in this world who have it in them to do something like that, some are probably related to you or your next door neighbor even. But you won't ever care until someone else tells you you should.

[Deleted]

Jul 9, 2020 9:34:23 GMT -5 The Escapist said:

I think we all can, to some extent. Not many people would turn down a Caravaggio, despite him murdering a man in 1606. It's just where you personally tend to draw the line. I think for me, proven pedophilia is what I just can't overcome. I can enjoy The Beatles while knowing what a bastard Lennon was, I can enjoy The Smiths while knowing what a twat Morrissey would later become, but I couldn't even try to enjoy The LostProhets while knowing what Ian Watkins did. But then as another user said, Picasso also abused children, but some of his paintings are among my favourites. I think everyone has a line, but it's a wibbly-wobbly one that depends on the type of art, when it was produced, the culture it was produced in, and a million other things.

Another point is that I always found it weird who the industry/public chooses which pop-culture figures deify and who to demonise. The Gallaghers are known as the biggest knobheads in rock music, but I'm still waiting on Pete Townshend's child-porn book he was so thoroughly researching. You couldn't find a more deified music figure than Elvis, but don't forget that his favourite type of girls were the 14-year-old ones. Chuck Berry videotaped women in toilets, Eric Clapton was an avowed racist, and the best argument to prove that David Bowie wasn't raping 14-year-old Lori Mattox is that Jimmy Page was busy doing it at the time. And yet none of these people have a cultural perception that stops people enjoying them. Bring up the Gallaghers, though, and it's "God, but aren't those guys real jackasses?".

I posted two interviews here a while ago in which Sonic Youth and Blur's drummer Dave Rowntree bullied a canadian interviewer namer Nardwuar. If it was Oasis who did it, you could see RYM users angrily putting a 1 star review on an Oasis album saying how "dickheads they are and it's impossible to go past that". Yet Sonic Youth (a band who produces a music I do like, don't get me wrong), you do read about them they were an "awesome intelligent band, experimenting with their music".

[Mean Mrs. Mustard]

It matters, sure, but I have no trouble seperating them in most cases.

Kasabian wasn't that great in the first place.

[Headmaster]

I think there is the "art" and there is the "artist", two different entities, the art won't magically disappear because the artist was a prick and did the wrong things, also you won't become a prick too because you liked his art, I know there are some people which are very sensitive toward these stuffs but you have to be mature enough to separete things.

[jojoww1877]

Jul 9, 2020 9:34:23 GMT -5 The Escapist said:

The Gallaghers are known as the biggest knobheads in rock music, but I'm still waiting on Pete Townshend's child-porn book he was so thoroughly researching.

Go read his autobiography then.

[jojoww1877]

Jul 10, 2020 2:31:22 GMT -5 The Escapist said:

Jul 10, 2020 2:13:21 GMT -5 jojoww1877 said:

Go read his autobiography then.

He was buying access to child porn websites to research...his own autobiography? 

He explains the whole situation in his autobiography.

[The Escapist]

Jul 10, 2020 2:13:21 GMT -5 jojoww1877 said:

Jul 9, 2020 9:34:23 GMT -5 The Escapist said:

The Gallaghers are known as the biggest knobheads in rock music, but I'm still waiting on Pete Townshend's child-porn book he was so thoroughly researching.

Go read his autobiography then.

I wasn't being serious about the book, there.

The lack of a book isn't actually the bad thing about giving your money to child abuse websites.

[jojoww1877]

Jul 10, 2020 2:39:08 GMT -5 The Escapist said:

Jul 10, 2020 2:13:21 GMT -5 jojoww1877 said:

Go read his autobiography then.

I wasn't being serious about the book, there.

The lack of a book isn't actually the bad thing about paying for child porn sites and returning to them repeatedly.

As I said, read his autobiography. He explains why he did it.

[The Escapist]

Jul 10, 2020 2:52:26 GMT -5 jojoww1877 said:

Jul 10, 2020 2:39:08 GMT -5 The Escapist said:

I wasn't being serious about the book, there.

The lack of a book isn't actually the bad thing about paying for child porn sites and returning to them repeatedly.

As I said, read his autobiography. He explains why he did it.

Bizarre hill for you to choose to die on, but here we go anyway: outside of official police work, there is no explanation that can stop knowingly giving your money to a child abuse website from being an almost unfathomably evil thing to do. 

[funhouse]

If you're all black or white regarding this issue I would say you're a bit weird. So much is to do with context. Since Ryan Adams got caught I havent listened to any of his "love songs" since that links directly to the issue about him, being flirting with fucking 14-year olds. I simply can't hear him going on about "feeling so bad for such a little girl" in La Cienega Just Smiled, which is just ruined for me now. But if To Be Young Is To Be Sad comes up on my playlist, I can put all that aside for three minutes. Maybe that's a bit hypocritical, but it's not like I'm buying his merch.

In the case with Kasabian I think I can "allow" myself to listen to most of the songs I like without them feeling tainted, because they're not very personal, which I guess is what it comes down to in the end. If the lyrics/subject matter of a song reflects the artist's views or actions, then I think there's a potential problem, but if not, well then it is(in most cases) different to me.

[Rolo]

Think it depends on how much you liked the artist in the first place. Also, over time, I think stuff often gets forgotten rightly or wrongly.

Ryan Adams is one of my favourite artists, regardless of what he has done, I still think his music is bloody great so I'm not going to deprive myself of it.

[Manualex]

If you tell me do You like Ryan Adams, Lostpropets(or whatever it is spelled), Brand New or PWRBTTM. I would say no, I havent listened to them prior to their scandals and because of that I don't have a conection to them nor I do want to have one. On the case of Kasabian, I hope that Tom learns that you can't mislead fans by pretending everything is fine and dandy, when you know it is not.

The rest of the band and their crew don't deserve to be thrown into the garbage bin, because of a issue they couldnt deal with publically until the trial was over. Should they waited until the trial was over to make one single statement or cordinated with Tom to have a joint one? I think would have been better than what they did, but it's a done thing, they can't go back and do it again.

I won't be listening to Kasabian unless it comes up in a shuffle, and when it does whether I feel good will be the reason i keep listening or not to them, but it wont be easy to keep doing it.

[2nz]

It's a tough one.

On one hand, Bowie made amazing music, and on the other Michael Jackson is a paedo vagina.

[oasisserbia]

I don't know them personally but I like watching interviews of all musicians that make music that I like.

It never happened to me that I like some music and then I go to watch his/her interview and he/she is complete idiot.

[matt]

I don’t listen to them these days aside from the first album but I think it is easier with regards to Tom Meighan - as suggested above, their songs aren’t exactly emotionally heavy or personal and they’re more of a fun ‘vibe’ band rather than anything spiritual or deep. Plus he doesn’t write the songs. I’d have a problem if I had some affection or admiration towards him but even before what was revealed last week, I never cared one bit about him. So I’ll go away and still enjoy the debut album.

It’s all relative and generally easier for bands in general. Like The Beatles, others can carry the weight (no pun intended) of the dislikable characteristics of certain individuals. Or in some cases, the situation is genuinely evil that it single handedly brings down the band (Lost Prophets). But a solo act is harder. I’ve got a few Ryan Adams albums and I have to admit, I still enjoy his music and I still think Prisoner is a great album, maybe down to the fact I just enjoy the songs and I don’t hear any unique personal outpouring meaning it doesn’t translate into a sense of empathy for him. But as funhouse said, it has permanently spoilt what were great moments that we thought gave us a glimpse of his soul (La Cienega Smiled).

At the end of the day though, for me it comes down to whether you’re obsession for the artist has translated into an affinity with the individual who writes it. I’d be distraught for example if Bruce Springsteen was revealed to be a monster. Even if he rarely writes autobiographically, the empathy and emotion and the way he can convey his politics not through lame angry proclamations but the personal suffering and musings of the characters he portrays, is a reflection of his altruistic character. I think anything to suggest he’s a monster would make him out to be nothing more than an emotional manipulator. It’s easier to listen to those who you never had an affinity with if they’ve done wrong but for those you really admire, I would find it harder to listen to. For those artists you genuinely love, the heartbreak would be so much harder to take.

[themanwholivesinhell]

Personally I can yes. I don't feel it makes you a supporter of whatever they did or allegedly did. I like the music for what it is, and I feel if you don't separate them then it’s just a slippery slope towards missing out on a lot of music. For example;

1) Where is the cut off point, personnel-wise?
Does it include the producer or songwriter, if they weren't the artist? They earn royalties from you buying it, after all. If i listen to Phil Spector productions like Be My Baby or Let It Be, am I supporting murder? R. Kelly produced a lot of other artists who did nothing wrong themselves, is listening to that supporting what he's accused of? 

2) Exactly what crime is bad enough to stop listening?
We've all done things wrong, but at what level do you say "no, I can't listen to them anymore"? While rape or paedophilia convictions will normally always be enough, what about things like assault or domestic violence? Plenty of legendary musicians like Ozzy Osbourne, John Lennon, James Brown and Chuck Berry have admitted to or been convicted of domestic violence. Is that bad enough?

So yes, the way that works for me is not to even think about what they got up to in private. Because if i did, I'd slowly start finding more and more not to listen to until i had nothing left, simply because I don't know where to draw the line.

[oasisserbia]

Is this what Tom did big thing in UK? It certanly is here, on this forum.

I hope it is. We see how many artist decades ago did the same thing and basically got away unpunished. I hope that we are making progress at least in things like this, when almost everything else is just getting worse.

[Elie De Beaufour 🐴]

Rocked ln YouTube asked this using the band with that Watkins in it. A lot of people seemed to go 'oh I don't listen to them because of him', is that different though?