pinegrove: cardinal

sorry, i didn't mean to come off that way, i'm "late" on plenty of stuff, too. and the bigger Pinegrove gets the better, would be great to have an amazing band full of amazing people get (relatively) huge.

actually that's kind of a fun thought experiment: what is Pinegrove's ceiling, success-wise. The National big? Bigger? Smaller? (I'm just picking a rock band headlining big theaters and amphitheaters, insert your own here)

it's hard for me to imagine this band headlining, say, a 5,000-capacity amphitheater, but i guess you never know.

oh lol i was just joking around alpine static. i actually agree that there's an atmosphere of overcorrection here (as there was with the new julien baker)

no i know, but just last week i was thinking (ok drafting a tweet in my mind but couldn't get it to fit) about how i silently judge/giggle at people who are an album behind me on an artist ... but also know there are people out there who are silently judging/giggling at me for being an album behind them. and the road goes on forever, or something.

idk, 15 yrs ago i actually let this dumb shit bother me, now it's just amusing.

a message from evan:

i am about to talk about something serious and i want to begin by saying that my actions have caused someone i care about deep emotional pain and i am so sorry.

i have been accused of sexual coercion. the accusation comes from someone i was involved with for a short but intense period of time. i won’t say more about this person because i want to respect her privacy and i ask anyone reading this to do the same.

the time we spent together was complicated. i believed we were mutually in love and we said it to each other often. but she also sometimes expressed reservation—she was dating someone else, and the dissolution of that relationship would have yielded intense personal and professional consequences. we talked about it thoroughly, endlessly. it was convoluted, heavy, emotional. this whole period felt like an impossible situation with no right answer, but we were working through it together.

eventually she broke up with her boyfriend. we got together again shortly after that, which lasted for about two weeks, during which we spent as much time together as possible. she met my parents. we discussed eventually moving in together. while it was by no means a simple relationship, it was sustained tenderly and i believed sincerely that it was mutual. i absolutely never threatened her, i never leveraged anything against her. i believed all of our decisions to be based in love.

still, i am coming to terms with the fact that i monumentally misread the situation. i am trying earnestly to follow this line as deeply as it goes to reflect on all of the things i could have done, and can do, better.

i should have more actively acknowledged my position of power as a public figure, and also as a man. i have always tried to approach all of my relationships under the premise of equality, but i see now more clearly that the inherent privilege of my gender and the accumulated privilege of being a recognized performer most certainly impacted this interaction.
and in reflecting on interactions with other people i've met through music, i see i could have been better there too. i have been flirtatious with fans and on a few occasions been intimate with people that i've met on tour. i've reached the conclusion now that that's not ever appropriate—even if they initiate it. there will always be an unfair power dynamic at play in these situations and it’s not ok for me to ignore that.

i am also led to something that i said regarding all this that i regret immensely. i said that i could sense who from the crowd would be interested in sleeping with me based on how they watched me perform. this comment applies such a dark layer to my interactions with people after our sets. nobody coming to a concert deserves to be evaluated based on their sexual potential by the performer. i absolutely crossed a line with that comment and that behavior, and i am so sorry.

i'm led further to consider my demeanor in most relationships i've been in. i can be very talkative and excitable, talking about wild plans, dreams, wanting to share everything. and i'm realizing that part of that confidence stems from my privilege as a man. i also realize that sort of approach doesn't leave room, or leave time, for my partner to reflect and come confidently to her feelings; that my enthusiasm doesn't leave space for any ambiguity on her end; it doesn't leave enough room for a meditative personal process. i believe that happened here too and i feel ashamed that my enthusiasm prevented me from listening as patiently as i should have.

i recognize that this is the beginning of a long process of reflection. in an effort to take time to make positive changes in my life and out of respect for what she is going through, we are cancelling our upcoming US tour. we'll be taking some time off in general. i started therapy on wednesday november 15th and plan to continue indefinitely. i am sincerely committed to improving my mental health and the way i treat everyone i interact with.
i am being held to account by the people close to me but the point of this post is not about me — it is an apology to the person i hurt and to the people i disappointed: my bandmates, my friends, my family, our fans. i’m so sorry. i have never felt remorse like this before. i will think about how i could have been better in this situation for as long as i live.
- evan

some discussion about this in the emo thread

So much horrible news coming out of this scene I can't even keep up with it anymore

https://www.spin.com/featured/punk-talks-pinegrove-controversy/

yeah i could not parse that article at all

Me neither.

Punks today clearly enjoy their run-on sentences.

https://pitchfork.com/features/article/reckoning-with-pinegrove/

Fascinating. I really enjoyed this.

The world desperately needs fewer bullies.

Awful, irresponsible journalism coming at the worst possible time and way to bury the lede that oh, their record is coming out in 2 days all of a sudden. JP is a great writer but this is really upsetting.

I still don’t trust Pinegrove or Evan, and I can’t see how others can when he can say shit like this: pic.twitter.com/SJxlVjF2ah

— Long Neck 🦕 (@LongNeckLass) September 26, 2018

I saw that tweet. Can someone explain to me what's terrible about his quotes in those screengrabs and why he should therefore be banished from making music forever?

Didn't say that, I don't care about Pinegrove, I think that p4k made a major journalistic mistake publishing this piece the day before what might be the biggest event of the #MeToo era, and that it's a thinly veiled advertorial.

why he should therefore be banished from making music forever?

― alpine static, Wednesday, September 26, 2018 1:37 PM (thirteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i don't think anyone is saying this

whole piece just made me feel weirder about this situation tbh

it is bizarre to read what is essentially a bunch of gossip get seriously reported on and publicly litigated like this.

also throw in a person posing as a therapist for kicks.

yeah

Whole situation is absolutely bizarre. I don't find those quotes in that tweet at all convincingly damming.

it is bizarre to read what is essentially a bunch of gossip get seriously reported on and publicly litigated like this.

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, September 26, 2018 5:12 PM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

And monetized!

sorry, y'all are right no one said he should be banished forever. i made the mistake of reading the replies to that tweet before posting.

i just don't understand what more ppl might want from him and this band to try atone for whatever happened. seems to me if the victim is ok w/ this, then that's what matters most. but there are a lot of people on twitter who definitely do not feel that way.

agree the timing is not great, w/r/t Kavanaugh. having a fan of the band do the story seems like a mistake, too, even if her cred is pretty bulletproof.

I should've posted in the p4k thread tbh, those quotes are far from the most galling sections of the piece

because they aren't really galling at all?

I’m shocked by the reaction!

Whole situation is absolutely bizarre. I don't find those quotes in that tweet at all convincingly damming.

Yeah. I found them sympathetic! I suppose I’m missing a lot of context. I didn’t know about this band or story until I read this article.

mostly i feel sympathy for the victim, who said they never wanted all this to be public and that it only happened due to the overzealousness of punk talks

its hard to know exactly what to make of it, but at best the pinegrove guy comes across as creepy and unable to form healthy relationships with women, and at worst, what could probably be termed abusive, so its hard to have much sympathy for him even if this whole ordeal hasnt quite been justice

mostly i feel sympathy for the victim, who said they never wanted all this to be public and that it only happened due to the overzealousness of punk talks

Yeah. Sympathy was too strong of a word. I agree with you.

People dislike those quotes bc it comes off as a wordier "I'm sorry if anyone was offended" not "I'm sorry for doing the wrong thing" --- allows him to maintain idea that he was always acting in Good faith and not predatorily

Stereogum aggregation of the piece has the headline "Pinegrove Address “Sexual Coercion” Statement, New Album Skylight Out This Friday," which pretty much seals why I feel so frustrated by this.

3/4 of the piece is extremely solid reporting, and then the last 1/4 is a handwringing fascination with their new album that makes the whole rest of the piece feel like excuse-making (even though it probably isn't). It's supposed to be edifying and clarifying, but it ends up (imo) just digging the situation deeper through editorial mistakes of context and timing.

I'm still not convinced that anything "newsworthy" actually happened tbh. I'm not a rabid fan or anything (couldn't hum anything but "Aphasia" off the top of my head) but this is maybe the only #MeToo-era "abuser gets outed!" that feels like it could be outright overblown. But again only "feels" because the way the whole thing was handled from the jump and has continued to be written about has made it impossible to say.

At least it's nice that ultimately terms were agreed upon and seemingly honored?

They retweeted quoted lyrics and fan art and endless bedroom-recorded covers of their earnest songs. At least one fan wrote a high school English paper analyzing Pinegrove lyrics. These young people called themselves Pinenuts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqqRB0YlZuw

they pesto now

haha i thought of this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xf-oitGkGEw

Stereogum aggregation of the piece has the headline "Pinegrove Address “Sexual Coercion” Statement, New Album Skylight Out This Friday," which pretty much seals why I feel so frustrated by this.

yes, this is what is so galling about the piece. it's positioned as a mea culpa with a reveal deep in the piece that hey! they have a new album out on Friday! it's just awful journalism, I don't know what's unclear about this.

this isn't p4k reporting on a release, it's a in depth feature!

yeah I hadn't thought of it until I noticed that they "broke" the album release news with that story. pretty dodgy move for a story crying out for straightforward writing

https://pinegrove.bandcamp.com/album/skylight

my position on this has evolved from "... ok" to "no thank you"

fyi I listened to this band's bandcamp page and they are awful

on the contrary, Cardinal is one of the best rock records of the decade

Truth, Alpine

began to read this piece a couple of days ago and got as far as "inchoate meaning" lmao

i'm a skeptic on these guys but giving it a listen and not sure having "shelved for a year" attached to this album is going to do it any favors.

I had a lot of trouble trying to read this & im not sure why

First listen through and I'm a bit meh, though it's probably a grower.

The sub-two minute songs aren't bangers like Problems and Angelina were.

The re-recording of Angelina doesn't add much.

i'm sorry but why is this on streaming

?

I don't understand the question either.

Also unsure

oh nvm sorry reread that. hm

sorry, review says "The band and label mutually agreed that Pinegrove would self-release Skylight and donate the proceeds to charity."

i, uh, liked this a lot. "skylight" is a beautiful song

thanks for trying to find some kind of consistent language everyone but it’s fine, it doesn’t matter, the rehabilitation is complete and i have to stop caring

does it matter at all that the rehabilitation, as it were, was coordinated w/ the victim

i’m not getting into it

Yeah most of the tracks are growing on me quite a bit.

And for me it's more than generous enough to give the sales to charity even without streaming revenues, it's still a job for them. Plus I often won't buy something without discovering it via streaming it first.

having read about this situation, what has the pinegrove guy done wrong except break up a relationship that was probably going to break up anyway

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AakhvdAW2o

no way are they donating streaming $ to charity. someone should ask them, if they are donating it I'm sure they'd be happy to answer.

well they'd better donate all or none of it so we can be sure if they're good people or not

i would like to apologize for starting this

we wanna announce that we’ll be playing a small run of shows towards the end of this year! tickets go on sale today at noon EST in the US and are on sale now in Europe. here’s the info:

November 23 – Montclair, NJ – The Guild Room at First Congregational Church
November 24 – Cambridge, MA – The Sinclair
November 26 – Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg

December 1 – Amsterdam, NL – Sugar Factory
December 3 – Berlin, DE – Cassiopeia
December 5 – Bristol, UK – Thekla
December 6 – London, UK – The Garage

December 12 – San Francisco, CA – Great American Music Hall
December 14 – West Hollywood, CA – Troubadour

the safety of our fans is a priority and we wanna emphasize our commitment to making sure everyone is as comfortable as possible at our shows. with that in mind, we’ll be partnering with organizations and volunteers trained in active bystander intervention in each city. more details on that to come.

tickets will be available at pinegroveband.com/tour. we’ll be donating a portion of profits from each ticket sale to planned parenthood.

welp, this thread - once teeming with enthusiasm for its namesake band - lies in tatters and neglect.

also, the new Pinegrove album is good.

cardinal is still special, skylight was disappointing even if you disregard all the...stuff. i haven't gotten around to the new album yet.

totally agree, though i think i liked Skylight more than you. (can barely remember Marigold, however.)

the new one isn't Cardinal either, but it's good.