A few weeks ago, I opened Instagram and it was staring at me. The infamous notes app apology. Upon first glance, I thought “Oh goodness, what Influencer said a slur again?” But instead it was posted by Dave Grohl’s instagram page, @davestruestories. Before getting to the content of the post I thought, how could this be? Family man Dave Grohl? I read right through his flowery language, he had a baby with a woman outside of his marriage. A dirty cheater was my next thought.
When I turned 13 something came over me, almost like an epiphany. I learned who the legendary band, Nirvana, was. I can confidently say Nirvana’s 1993 MTV performance is the only record that my 21 century born self has played until worn. Then at 14, after listening to thousands of minutes of Nirvana, I graduated to Foo Fighters. Hearing their 1997 hit, “Everlong” transports me to freshman year spring break when that was the only song my Spotify played. Even though I am only 17, listening to Dave Grohl’s music during some of my more formative years has made me feel like I am part of each band he has been in. For my 17th birthday, one of my closest friends, and fellow staff writer Lucy Gabel, gifted me a Foo Figther’s poster. I have yet to put it up, now I don’t know if I will. For the first time I am experiencing something hundreds of thousands of music fans/listeners have experienced, disappointment.
A tale as old as time: is the artist separate from the art? I’m not sure. Art imitates life. This is how we are able to visualize Joan of Arc, this is how we know what being a peasant in Europe during the black death looked like. Art and life are simultaneous, not just in music or painting, but in all art forms. We as humans learn about the past and present through art, not through algebra, not through calculus, and certainly not through chemistry (a class I had to retake). We learn about the artist through art. We know that Kayne, or whatever he goes by now, was influenced by Nas just by listening to “College Dropout”. We know that Taylor Swift is somewhat of a feminist just by listening to “The Man”. But we don’t know when artists do something morally wrong through their creations. It’s not like they are going to admit it, unless you are Jay Z on 4:44.
This begs the question, “should I stop listening to all artists that do something wrong?” To me, this is unanswerable. The question is more, “would there be much music left to listen to?” I understand that by still enjoying the art it is somewhat excusing their wrongdoings, but if you don’t you have now blocked yourself off from the art. Art that could impact you deeply. I am going to admit it, I still listen to Kanye in spite of his hundreds of racist and antisemitic tweets. I still watch Alfred Hitchock movies every Halloween despite him being known for various forms of harassment on set. I still enjoy Piccasso’s work even though he was a known misogynist . When enjoying their work, sadly, I am reminded of their wrong doings, but I am not stopped by them.
This brings us the current culture of canceling artists for anything they do that could be perceived as wrong. I see this as a way to trap artists, make them scared of a hammer that will smash their career with any wrong move. Remember Janis Jackson’s Superbowl performance, what happened wasn’t necessarily her fault, but her career hasn’t been the same since. If we as a society are sitting on our phones waiting for the next artist to mess up, will artists feel they are trapped? With this type of harsh cancellation of artists, would we have art from the past 200 years? It is likely if our culture today was seen throughout history, we would not have the art that is cherished today.
There may never be a real answer to all of these questions but for me, I take an artist’s personal life with a grain of salt. A very small grain.
