Why Are We Cancelling Charley Crockett for a Satanic Duo?

I’m sorry folks, but this whole thing just stinks. And though there’s other pressing matters that deserve to be addressed in the country music world at the moment, this situation really speaks to many of the ills plaguing it. It smacks of everything that’s wrong with online discourse. It illustrates the “who you know” aspect of the music industry that locks so many deserving artists out of it, and unfairly elevates so many connected and privileged artists into it. It also deals with the media’s duplicity, and their agenda-driven approach to coverage.

There is also a very real possibility that we are witnessing Charley Crockett being legitimately “cancelled,” or at least the attempt to cancel him—and everything that loaded term entails. At the moment, it’s time to sound the red alert, and really try to step back, take a deep breath, take a broader and more dispassionate perspective, and ask what’s really going on right now with this artist.

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Before anything else, just as was said when the issue of Charley Crockett canceling two of Twin Temple’s opening performances first came up, the person who made the ultimate mistake in this matter is Charley Crockett. He should have properly vetted them better. He should have never agreed to have them play if he didn’t feel it was appropriate. And as opposed to going on a holier than thou kick on social media afterwards, he should have just apologized and left it at that.

I’ll go even further to say that through all the controversies and criticisms that Charley Crockett has been a party to over the years—and there have been many—his belief that he can use grandiose, slogan-filled rhetoric to paper over them or weasel his way out of them has exposed the thinness of his rhetorical talent.

Most all country music stars of the past and present have engaged in some level of myth building behind their persona. The Father of Country Music Jimmie Rodgers did it. The “Kings” of country music Roy Acuff and Hank Williams did it. The Outlaws of the ’70s most certainly did it. And so do the artists of today, including, if not especially the ones who love to claim they don’t, like Sturgill Simpson.

But the higher the profile and the more popular an artist becomes, the hotter the heat and the more the wax starts to melt. Charley Crockett is feeling that heat right now. As he said recently in a now-deleted Instagram post, “Know what’s really crazy? For all the drama I got into with Wallen & Beyonce & Adcock, I never had so much violence threatened against me and all I did was ask an opening band to drop two shows they’re being paid for.”

As Crockett and others have since confirmed, he did pay Twin Temple for the shows, just like Crockett paid his entire band and crew for an entire Canadian tour he didn’t play because he was stopped at the border due to previous drug charges (that incidentally, hadn’t hindered him getting into Canada in the past). So as much as Crockett deserves credit for his mistakes, he also takes personal responsibility for them, including the Twin Temple cancellation, which has been the mother of all massive publicity boon’s for the Satanic duo.

Nonetheless, the veneer of Charley Crockett’s persona is starting to wear thin for many, and frankly, from mostly unforced, and self-inflicted errors. Now even folks who still support Charley Crockett are acknowledging this. There’s a whole trend on social media of people mocking Charley Crockett by acting like they’re him, and mimicking his pseudo inspirational speeches.

But all that said, the fact that Twin Temple has leveraged this situation into a career-launching moment while Charley Crockett gets thrown under the bus—including by his fellow musicians and by people who’d never even heard of Crockett before but just joined the online fracas for engagement—feels like an incredibly unjust moment, and frankly, smacks of a deeper agenda.

Hating on Charley Crockett has become an element of online fashion. As just one of many examples, video production company Western AF reposed an old Charley Crockett video amid the drama. It basically became a massive funnel for commenters and multiple artists to dunk on Charley.

When the fracas first broke out, there were quite a few conspiracy theorists who came out of the woodwork claiming it was all just a publicity stunt to draw attention to Charley Crockett and Twin Temple. The problem with that theory is that Charley Crockett was taking it in the teeth, and still is. No, not all publicity is good publicity, and we’re finding that out with Charley Crockett in real time.

Is Crockett legitimately under threat of having his career ended completely? Of course not. Can you see this affecting Crockett’s career long-term? With the way this issue has become so effusive and such a social contagion online—and such a cultural litmus test for certain people on the political left—it absolutely has become significant, if not catastrophic for Charley Crockett’s career. That is probably one of the reasons Crockett hasn’t just wiped his social media accounts, but completely deleted them Wednesday morning (7-15).

On Tuesday (7-14), it was revealed in a detailed feature and interview with Twin Temple in Rolling Stone Country (of course) that Shooter Jennings was the producer for Twin Temple’s upcoming album. Now we’ve confirmed that the “favor for a friend” Charley Crockett was fulfilling by booking Twin Temple in the first place was for Shooter Jennings. It’s very likely that when the suggestion came from Shooter, Charley thought Shooter would never recommend them if they weren’t appropriate for one of his shows. This is likely why Crockett only tacitly vetted the decision. He trusted Shooter.

Now, not only has Twin Temple received a massive boost through the controversy at Charley Crockett’s expense, they have now leveraged that controversy into a spread from a country music publication. Oh, and it happens to be that their new album is said to be more country-oriented and they’re looking to enter the country music space. It all seems so perfect.

Was all of this premeditated—the controversy, the Rolling Stone profile, and the launch of the album for this self-proclaimed Satanic act? Probably not. But the the way it was handled most absolutely throws red meat to those conspiracies, and frankly, is very opportunistic by Twin Temple, Rolling Stone, and editor Joseph Hudak, and in a way that kicks Charley Crockett when he’s down. If they had any sort of finger on the pulse or compunction, they would have waited a week or two at the absolute least before using the moment to double down on blaming Charley Crockett, claiming their “artistic freedom” was violated, and that they’re being persecuted by Crockett’s decision.

But let’s recognize that Twin Temple would have never been opening shows for Charley Crockett in the first place without their “who you know” inside track via Shooter Jennings. Twin Temple was never appropriate for those Charley Crockett shows. They would have gone over terribly, and despite Crockett’s mistake of initially giving them the okay, it was the right decision for all parties to cancel the gigs, including for Twin Temple.

For the record, Shooter clearly feels bad for what’s happening to Charley Crockett. He wrote an extremely lengthy post about Charley Crockett and his latest album Clovis on July 11th. Nothing about elevating Twin Temple and undermining Charley Corckett feels intentional from Shooter, even if he inadvertently set it all in motion.

This might feel like a random non-sequitur and self-promotion. But this is the entire reason Saving Country Music started The Hook—a form that allows anyone up on stage to perform and circumvent the music industry bias. It’s these very payoff deals and “favors” for producers, these “Hey, your artists guested on our track, so now we need them to open on these shows” that result in bad bookings of openers, and package deals at festivals where to get headliners promoters have to also agree to poorly-curated undercard acts. And meanwhile, talented performers out there that deserve opening spots continue to hit brick walls because they’re not connected like Twin Temple was.

And let’s not gloss over the fact that in the Rolling Stone Country profile (read free version on Yahoo), when asked if they’re actual Satanists, Twin Temple proudly proclaim, “Hell yeah!,” and go on to say they, “practice witchcraft. Zach does practice ceremonial magic. We are students of the occult and find the tradition very interesting, ideologically and philosophically. It’s all those things, and that’s really why we made Twin Temple in the first place. It’s really fun to go shopping for a human skull and a Ronettes record in the same day, and we get to do that with our band.”

They also strangely claim, “I think the thing that resonates with us with Satanism, or the broader tradition of the ‘left-hand path,’ as you would call it, is that it is not dogmatic. So, there’s no proselytizing.” But they quite literally open their show compelling the audience to pledge allegiance to Satan (see video). This was likely what did them in with Charley Crockett. Not the music.

One of the reasons this story went massively viral is because it gave certain people on the political left the ability to virtue signal on social media. By claiming Charley Crockett’s cancellation was some sort of Reagan-era version of a Satanic scare (which it never was), they could use it as a stand-in for their hatred for conservatives and Christians. The majority of online comments claim that Crockett was MAGA, or a “conservative country artist.” The problem though is that Charley Crockett is none of these things.

This was a headline Saving Country Music took special notice of and clipped all the way back in February. It came in the aftermath of Charley Crockett calling out President Trump in a social media post.

To platform and promote a band that’s ordering human skulls online to use in Satantic rituals, politically-slanted outlets like Rolling Stone Country and the scores online looking for social media clout threw one of the few actual established country artists willing to speak out against Trump completely under the bus, and then have continued to run over him again and again. To use a Satanic term, they have sacrificed Charley Crockett for a Satanic doo-wop band. Congratulations.

Crockett recently said on social media, “Well, now I know how it feels when they try to cancel you on the right AND the left.“

As insufferable as those on the political right are with their self-aggrandizement, the left will eat their own in a moment’s notice if it helps gain them social capital. That is what is on full display in the Charley Crockett situation. Meanwhile, victimhood is also how you gain social clout. And this supposed “Satanic” band is playing the victim card perfectly. And even if they weren’t, it was being played for them by political opportunists already.

And that’s what going on. The public is getting played, and giving into a lynch mob-style fervor. And however cosplay you might think Charley Crockett is, country music will be much worse off if an artist like Charley Crockett is replaced in stature with a Satanic duo converting to country for an album.

The reason some are emphatically pushing Twin Temple is because they believe they will undermine the Christian values of the country music genre, and because they’re victims of the music industry, when in truth, Twin Temple hit the proverbial jackpot in this scenario. Some continue to have grandiose beliefs that through the medium of country music, they will convert the American rural electorate from red to blue. The problem is they’ve been trying to do this ever since Trump came down the golden escalator in 2015.

Yet all they’ve accomplished in this political effort is creating collateral damage like the career of Charley Crockett, and they have made mainstream country music even more right-wing, and even more Christian to an unhealthy, and unbalanced degree. Undercutting Charley Crockett continues this work, while also undermining one of the most hard working and engaging country entertainers to emerge from the independent country scene in the the last decade. He released nearly 20 albums in the last 11 years, and his latest Clovis might be his best. Twin Temple is releasing a “country-inspired” record, and might never release another one again.

Charley Crockett is far from perfect. But canoninzing and platforming a Satanic duo at Charley Crockett’s expense is a grave sin that will cost country music dearly, and be one it will have to answer to for many years to come, just like with the Dixie Chicks.

The next few hours and days are very critical. Will the independent country music community make the right decision when it comes to Charley Crockett, or will they give into a ridiculous online fervor?

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