End of an Era: The Brockhampton Stan to Anti Pipeline
Collage by Alex Ramos / Source photo by Ashlan Grey
Content warning: This piece contains mentions of sexual assault.
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There is no one that hates Brockhampton more than their ex-fans.
As 2021 wraps up, I’ve been coming across list after list of people ranking their favorite albums of the year. On them, Brockhampton’s Roadrunner: New Light, New Machine comes up more than I thought it would. Seeing it featured leaves a sour taste in my mouth, as I’m inevitably reminded of the group’s problematic past.
I’m fortunate enough to say I never got the infamous couch tattoo, but I’ll admit — reluctantly — that a Brockhampton lyric is printed smack under my yearbook portrait, as my senior quote. I guess you could say they still managed to leave a permanent scar; my Spotify’s list of most listened artists of all time will agree.
At their peak, I was very active on Brockhampton stan Twitter, a corner of the internet where I participated in every #bhselfieday, and rushed to interact with Kevin Abstract’s soon to be deleted tweets. It was cult-like. I watched as many of my social media mutuals began to form their own collectives with other fans, a move clearly inspired by the group. While Brockhampton did not pioneer the concept of a collective, they still had a substantial influence over their creative fans. Some of those same fans are vocal against them today.
Brockhampton dropped the fucking ball. They came onto the scene in 2017 with Saturation, their album trilogy, which took on an inspiring, homemade approach that was rare in the industry at the time. They quickly generated a large, dedicated following. But just as quickly as they blew up, their career hit a wall. Controversies surrounding some members took a toll on their fan base.
With the departure of former member Ameer Vann in 2018, due to sexual assault accusations, the Brockhampton fanbase came undone. It left them in a tough situation in terms of where to stand on the “best boy band since One Direction,” and whether they should continue to support them and their art or not. It was a confusing time as a fan, as it revealed the true colors of the group: false idols that preached values like diversity and feminism, but failed to show up when it really mattered. They remained silent on the issue for upwards of a week, with fans pulling their hair out, waiting for any sort of statement to come out.
There is something very disappointing about seeing people that you look up to fail to acknowledge the hypocrisy in their actions, and how they failed to live what they preached in their music. After all, that was what I, as a fan, was proud to support.
“Respect my mother, ‘spect my sister, ‘spect these women boy,” Matt Champion passionately shouts on “JUNKY,” a single off SATURATION II. The message was supposed to be loud and clear.
As a victim of sexual assault who was actually coming to terms with my own experience around the time these allegations broke, it was not easy news. It was difficult to process that the very people I was turning to for a temporary get-away and distraction from my own assault case, were simultaneously contributing to another woman’s similar pain. It felt like betrayal. Music should serve as a safe space, something to escape the struggles of one’s own life, to provide comfort and help you accept feelings that might be harder than usual to grasp.
Knowing the truth about who created the music I was clinging onto at the time formed an uncomfortable atmosphere surrounding their art. It became harder to listen to and support them. Plenty of other their fans felt this way too; not only did they abandon the group, but they vocally expressed their disappointment and disgust. Every once in a while, on Twitter, I’ll stumble across the group’s name — censored like a curse word.
Despite all this, almost four years after the allegations, I find myself coming back to their music every once in a while, even rushing to Spotify at midnight to check their latest release. I am and have been vocally against them in the past, so every time I make the occasional return to their music, I find myself asking why I keep coming back. It might simply be their music, which is sonically appealing to me. But on an even deeper level, I think it’s rooted in my feelings of dissatisfaction, which came along with turning my back on them so suddenly, along with the small glimmer of hope that the people I once idolized would still be the same as I originally perceived them.
With the remaining members, there are still some controversies and allegations left untouched. Brockhampton is a reminder that, in a sense, the people we look up to are people we do not know at all. There are things going on behind the scenes that we’ll never know about. As a passionate music lover, I’m here for just that: the music. ◆