‘Why listen to a jerk?’ Max Futcher on the musicians he’s cancelled

There’s a lot of great music that I just can’t listen to any more but I do have my reasons.

There’s a lot of great music that I just can’t listen to any more. You might say I’ve personally cancelled some artists, but I do have my reasons. The tunes are still fantastic, but the musicians are no longer palatable, to me anyway.

Michael Jackson is an obvious case in point.

Jacko is one of the highest selling recording artists in history, and his music is just sublime, but his legacy is stained, and while fans and critics debate what really happened at Neverland Ranch with those kids, I can’t bring myself to listen to Beat It, or Thriller, or Billie Jean.

For me, when I’m blasting music from the car stereo, or annoying the neighbours with a Saturday playlist, it’s a reflection of my mood. I’m buying into the musician as much as the music, so something isn’t sitting right for me when it comes to Michael Jackson.

Michael Jackson in 2009. Picture: Carl DE SOUZA / AFP

The same goes for Gary Glitter, Marilyn Manson and R. Kelly. My skin crawls a bit each time my 12-year-old daughter marches through the house singing “I believe I can fly”.

It’s not just the (alleged) sex offenders. I take issue with those who appear to have abandoned the thing that made their music so appealing. Every time I
hear the opening bursts of Beds are Burning, or Power and the Passion, I have to change the station.

Don’t get me wrong, I once loved Midnight Oil. I remember a classic night on the grassy slope at Woodford Folk Festival, where the rain belted down and Peter Garrett and the gang blew the crowd away with their raw energy.

But then Peter Garrett was preselected for the ALP (I still remember him standing alongside Mark Latham in an ill-fitting suit). Then he became a minister of the Crown. The final straw for me was sitting in the “pink batts” Royal Commission listening to him give evidence about the failings of an ill-conceived government program.

He was speaking like a minister, steeped in bureaucratic jargon, and he seemed so far from the lead singer of the most important protest band of a generation.

It was hard to believe this was the same guy who waved his hands around, almost possessed as he ambushed the Exxon building atop a truck in New York. That bloke no longer exists for me, and despite their comeback since Garrett left politics, I am not interested any more.

He’s no longer “kicking it to the Man”. Peter Garrett became the Man.

And that brings me to Queen.

I think Queen are one of the greatest bands in the world, but the actions of their poodle-maned lead guitarist a couple of years ago have left me cold. Brian May was in Australia to play the bushfire benefit concert, which was to be broadcast on Channel 7.

Brian May of Queen. Picture: Joel Carrett

When he landed at Brisbane Airport, there was a gaggle of fans swarming his car, all with their phone cameras, filming his every move. One of Seven’s news cameramen was also there, doing his job, filming May ahead of the charity gig.

May made it clear he didn’t want to be filmed, so the cameraman backed off and set his big broadcast camera down.

Now, it happens this cameraman was also a massive Queen fan, so, like the dozen others there, he grabbed his phone and got some pictures of May. When May saw him, he went over and assaulted him. The footage shows May slapping the cameraman so his phone fell away.

When the cameraman (a shy, timid bloke) returned to the office, he was shattered. A man he’d held in such high esteem had lashed out at him.

But it got worse. May then posted on his social media site to his legion of fans, making out he was the victim, unleashing his minions with a barrage of vitriol on a man May never knew, and treated like garbage.

So no, I’m sorry to say that the rest of Queen have lost me as a listener because of their cantankerous old guitar slinger. Of course, they don’t care, and May doesn’t either. Maybe Brian May is a nice bloke, but on that particular day I formed the opinion that Brian May is a jerk.

And the world has too much other great music, so why listen to a jerk?

Channel 7's Max Futcher. Picture: Tara Croser.