Separating the art from the artist: When music becomes problematic

Some of my most cherished memories in life are of dancing around my kitchen, hand in hand with my mom, singing “Everyday is Like Sunday,” or driving across country with her and leaning over the center console to turn “Girlfriend in a Coma” just a little bit louder. Morrissey was an intrinsic part of my teenage years; my mom set my love for Morrissey and Johnny Marr as a standard of being her daughter. Through many of Morrissey’s concerts, she instilled in me proper concert etiquette: putting your phone the fuck away and just dancing. Before too long, I dyed my hair black, got bangs, and invested in an extensive collection of Dr. Martens. 

Last May, Morrissey starred on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” to play some work from his later solo career. His performance had its expected melodramatic nature, but that wasn’t what caught viewers’ eyes. Instead, it was the tiny pin adorning his lapel with the logo of the “For Britain Movement,” a far-right UK political party well known for its anti-Islamic agenda and immigration intolerance. 

I was blindsided. I had been to far too many of his concerts to count, all at which he preached against Donald Tr*mp and blatantly denounced police brutality. He led on a liberal facade, so in no way could I have foreseen him supporting the agenda of another party so similar to that of Tr*mp’s. Amid all of my nostalgic embraces, was I just blissfully choosing to not pay attention?

Once I began paying attention, it beckoned the cliché question: when is it okay to separate the art from the artist? Should I consider Morrissey’s immigration agenda each time I stroll campus with “Cemetery Gates” playing in my ears? I had allowed him and The Smiths to become such an ingrained aspect of my musical identity, if not my identity as a whole, that I was allowing my admiration to fog over his not-so-subtle bigotry. 

Morrissey’s political agenda has shown that the time for excusing such behavior has passed; it’s time to hold the artists we follow to the same standards we hold ourselves. This begins by evaluating our intake of these mediums and realizing our support is a green light for these acts to continue. We need to question if there is ever an appropriate time to take their music, films, paintings, etc., and enjoy them without considering the actions of the hand that made it. Is there ever an appropriate time to enjoy a Woody Allen or Harvey Weinstein film? The answer is an obvious no, but why isn’t the answer as obvious in other cases?

Recently, in what feels like my own backyard, there has been a tidal wave of sexual abuse allegations against members of the Southern California music scene. The list is so ongoing that it may be easier to list the bands who do not have allegations against them. There has been an overwhelming amount of recounts of grooming and pedophelia by older band members preying on young fans. For these older men to take advantage of their faint stardom is repulsive in the least. No amount of fame will ever make these accounts excusable. The music industry should never grant space for such behaviors, yet these actions were known about to some degree while ticket sales continued to rise.

This news shattered my love for my home’s music scene, mainly so because, on some level I always knew it was there. There’s a complicated allure in the idea of being the next Penny Lane from the film, Almost Famous— breaking through the dense egos of musicians to nestle your young self into the wild scene. But Penny Lane was 16 and her relationship was with a troubled guitarist well beyond 27. Penny’s naiveté confounded her lust for belonging in a world she idolized, but she can’t be to blame for a relationship with an older man; rock n’ roll called to her like a siren and she fell prey to the grimy musicians who seek out such innocence. 

Los Angeles isn’t the only city with Penny Lanes. Young girls everywhere admire the wild vibrance of the music scene, but the men who prey on such innocence need to be held accountable and tried by their supporters. This news was broken to me by a band that I could not have felt any closer to: The Buttertones. They were my perfect image of Southern California music; their sound smoothly melded surf-rock and post-punk with a foggy jazz vibe that belonged in the back of a smokey New York bar. It was seductive and they knew it; they used their seduction to take in their own pool of Penny Lanes. 

Cody Blanchard of Shannon and the Clams seamlessly addressed the root of this toxic behavior in an Instagram post in July, unfurling why underground musicians continue to fester in the lingering fog of rock n’ roll and it’s lack of accountability; “Unfortunately the entire industry at-large and our particular underground music scene is saddled with a toxic and ever present undercurrent that is a poisonous vestige of the lawless bygone days of rock and roll that brocken men still cling to and defend.”

Artists are the gatekeepers of our culture, speaking for the hearts of our communities and manifesting what we value into mediums. If those same gatekeepers are flush with the dirt of racism, pedophelia, and sexual abuse, then what does that reflect on our culture? If we stand by and promote the work of artists who perpetuate such wrongdoings, then we are allowing these acts to infiltrate and represent our culture. These same acts are committed beyond the boundaries of artists, but when we fog our judgement by idolizing them and allowing such heinous actions, we’re simultaneously permitting these acts everywhere. By turning a blind eye to their acts, then we are, in turn, giving a green light to the many Brock Turners of the world. 

For those of us fortunate enough to come out of 2020 unscathed, or relatively held together, we must respond to the warnings this year has brought. To touch on the circulating cliché, we cannot return to normal because normal wasn’t working. The forefront of the media has been flooded with matters long overdue, which are consequently boiling over. The United State’s privatized healthcare system, in tandem with our failure to uplift science, has molded us into the world’s center of COVID-19 tragedy.

Our heavily institutionalized systemic racism has birthed such deeply entrenched prejudice that by merely promoting that Black lives matter is slandered as “reverse racism” and radicalism. And, now, we find ourselves in the wake of musicians’ sexual abuse allegations as the result of aging misogonistic abuse labeled as “rock n’ roll.” If we do not mend the obvious problems 2020 has pushed into our laps, then I have little faith we ever will. 

But I’m optimistic. Art has an audience and if we demand that our artists support the change that this world needs, then we can begin to faithfully represent the values of our society. We must toss aside our blind habits of idolizing artists and examine their actions at face value, as we would any other person. In the music industry, this begins by booting artists like Morrissey, as well as every musician who has misused their following to indulge in bigotry. 

Written by Natalie Gott