Hedley hammered as #MeToo movement hits music industry
Abbotsford rockers feeling fallout from sexual misconduct accusations
In less than a week, Abbotsford recording artists Hedley went from touring Canada with two supporting acts and a popular new album to pariahs ensnared in allegations of sexual misconduct.
On Monday, accusations that band members Jacob Hoggard, Dave Rosin, Tommy Mac, and Jay Benison engaged in sexual behaviour with teenage girls surfaced on Twitter under the hashtag #outHedley2k18.
No one in the band has been charged with a crime.
But by Friday evening, the rockers had been dumped by their warm-up act Neon Dreams, terminated by their handlers at Watchdog Management and the Feldman Agency, banned from more than 130 Bell Media, CBC and Corus radio stations — and dropped from their date to play the 2018 Juno Awards.
The band is nominated for three Junos.
Hedley and controversial hiphop artist R. Kelly may be the first in a wave of Twitter campaigns against musicians inspired by the #MeToo movement that has cut a swath through Hollywood’s elite over the past few months.
At the Grammy Awards just a few weeks ago, there were indications #MeToo would soon spread to the music industry when a host of female musicians predicted to Entertainment Weekly that women’s stories would surface soon and reshape the industry.
“I think the ball is rolling and it’s just gonna keep growing; it’s not gonna stop,” Lana Del Ray told EW.
Kelly secretly wed his 15-yearold protégé Aaliyah — a union that was later annulled — and has been forced to defend himself from numerous allegations that he had sex with underage girls. He is the target of the #MuteRKelly Twitter campaign aimed at ending his musical career organized by arts activist Oronike Odeleye and child pornography survivor Kenyette Barnes. Kelly was acquitted of child pornography charges in 2008.
“Allegations of sexual misconduct against high-profile figures in the music business up to this point have mostly been confined to African-American rap artists and so far nothing has really stuck,” said Janine Benedet, a professor of law at University of B.C.’s Peter A. Allard School of Law.
The biggest stars in the music business often own their record labels.
“Many of them own the companies that produce their work rather than being employees,” she said. “They are more like independent businesspeople.”
The music industry has long celebrated an outlaw lifestyle, one our society has “normalized,” Benedet said.
“The slogan ‘sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll’ exists for a reason. It’s only now that women have taken a step back and realized that what happened to them was the result of highly predatory behaviour by powerful men,” she said.
Hedley ’s long-standing relationship with the WE philanthropic group also appears over, as the organization says it has “no plans to work with Hedley in the future.”
Hedley plans to complete the remaining dates on their tour, but according to the Brandon Sun, no journalists would be admitted to their concert Friday night in Brandon, Man.
The band issued a statement on their Facebook page which notes the allegations “are simply unsubstantiated and have not been validated,” and that the band respects and applauds the #MeToo movement.
“There was a time, in the past, when we engaged in a lifestyle that incorporated certain rock and roll clichés,” it reads. “However, there was always a line that we would never cross.”
A series of Twitter-based movements have empowered millions of women to tell stories of rape and sexual abuse, at first under the hashtag #NotOkay popularized by Canadian humour writer Kelly Oxford, and more recently #MeToo, started by civil rights activist Tarana Burke in 2006, and propelled by actress Alyssa Milano in October.
Allegations by women have sidelined the careers of some of the most powerful men in film and television, including film producer Harvey Weinstein, TV host Charlie Rose, comedian Louis CK, and others.
Hedley’s fall from grace could be the beginning of a wave of allegations against an industry that has been historically successful at deflecting the consequences of impropriety.
Former groupie Lori Mattix told Thrillist that she lost her virginity to David Bowie when she was just 14. Her teenage antics with rock stars including Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, and those of fellow “baby groupie” Sable Starr helped inspire the character Penny Lane in the film Almost Famous.
Starr reportedly had a relationship with New York Dolls guitarist Johnny Thunders at the age of 16, and became pregnant. Many of her relationships with rock stars were detailed in magazine articles at the time and in books such as Please Kill Me: the Uncensored Oral History of Punk, though without any apparent consequence to the male musicians involved. rshore@postmedia.com