Kings of Leon respond to Glee Creator with "Homophobic Rant"... Really? Really?

[Sampiro]

Too mild for the pit and possibly more IMHO but since it’s about a pop group and a hit TV show I’ll put it here and let Mods sort it out.

Ryan Murphy, creator of the TV show GLEE, wanted to use a Kings of Leon song on the show. For whatever reason Kings of Leon said no. In an interviewRyan Murphy said this:

“F— you, Kings of Leon…They’re self-centered assholes, and they missed the big picture. They missed that a 7-year-old kid can see someone close to their age singing a Kings of Leon song, which will maybe make them want to join a glee club or pick up a musical instrument. It’s like, OK, hate on arts education. You can make fun of Glee all you want, but at its heart, what we really do is turn kids on to music.”

I am honestly more familiar with the medieval royalty of Leon than I am with the Kings of Leon. I could tell you there was a band by that name but I couldn’t have told you its members were brothers named Followill, one of whom is named Caleb and responded

“This whole Glee thing is a shock to us. It’s gotten out of hand. At the time of the request, we hadn’t even seen the show. It came at the end of that record cycle, and we were over promoting [“Use Somebody”]. This was never meant as a slap in the face to Glee or to music education or to fans of the show. We’re not sure where the anger is coming from.”

which to me seems perfectly reasonable. Allegedly the Kings of Leon rarely if ever license their music to others anyway, but if they license it to anybody with $6 and a harmonica usually but for whatever reason didn’t want to license it to GLEE then it’s completely 100% their property to do with as they see fit.

So, another Followill brother (a name that reminds me of Figalilly from Nanny and the Professor), Nathan, tweeted on the subject when the interview came out in what Huffington Post referred to as a homophobic rant. Here is the tweet:

“Dear Ryan Murphy, let it go. See a therapist, get a manicure, buy a new bra. Zip your lip and focus on educating 7yr olds how to say fuck.”

O…kay.

Does anybody else interpret the above as a “Homophobic Rant”? I mean, I’m nearing 6 on the Kinsey Scale and I just can’t get worked up over this one.

I’m assuming they are referring to the lines “get a manicure, buy a new bra”.
Personally I don’t see this as a homophobic slur any more than saying “get your panties out of a wad” would be homophobic.

I have no doubt that Murphy being gay and the “buy a bra” thing were more than tangentially related (manicures are de rigeur for entertainers and executives in Hollywood). However, I think it’s less about Murphy being gay than Murphy acting like a douche and perhaps even implying (cue Samuel L. Jackson) “If you wanna act like a bitch then you oughtta dress like a bitch, BITCH!”

Homophobic rant would imply a deliberate slur against gays. This seems to be rather specifically slamming Ryan Murphy, who frankly seems to need slamming. I usually like his show but if the above comments on KoL, which I found far more insulting that Fezziwig’s tweet, are any indication then he seems to have a Varuca Salt sense of entitlement and delusions of grandeur, or else I’d like to see a flow chart showing how a child’s liberal arts/musical education is going to be negatively affected enough to pop the pimple on a flea’s ass by whether or not Kings of Leon license a song to you, and while I don’t like the words queer (in certain contexts) or faggy being used lightly neither should homophobic or rant or kumquat. (There’s nothing homophobic or otherwise insulting about kumquat but I just don’t like it- sounds sexual and racist and otherwise insulting all at the same time.)

So what’s your opinion? Was this a homophobic rant?

[Nametag]

:rolleyes: Take your issues to the Pit, kumquat.

[Sampiro]

@Nametag

:rolleyes: Take your issues to the Pit, kumquat.

There is no call for that type of racist/sexual/homophobic and, I strongly suspect, antisemitic and antiroyalist and antiBelgian slur in this forum.

[RealityChuck]

They actually don’t have the right to deny permission as long as Glee pays the proper fees. They can control its use in commercials, but not in a TV show.

[An_Gadai]

Sounds like bullshit to me. There are plenty of reasons why a band wouldn’t want to licence their music to that show or any other. I think it was kinda unprofessional of Murphy to talk like that.

Oh yeah and i don’t think that comment was homophobic but ymmv.

[An_Gadai]

@RealityChuck

They actually don’t have the right to deny permission as long as Glee pays the proper fees. They can control its use in commercials, but not in a TV show.

I think there might be a difference in this regard between using a recorded song on the soundtrack and them singing the song on the show.

Like if the Glee cast wanted to record a cover of a KOL song and put it on an album KOL definitely couldn’t stop them but I’m just not sure how the rights are with regard to using a song in actual fabric of a show.

[2ply]

Glee needs permission from the artist to perform their music because the show uses the songs in so many different mediums. In addition to the broadcast showing, there is also the streaming of episodes online and on DVD, and the Itunes sales, which all have different rules attached to whether an artist’s consent is needed.

Streaming music online isn’t cheap, the RIAA has seen to that, and shows like WKRP and In Living Color don’t include the music on their DVDs because the rights to do so were never secured when the shows originally ran and would be too expensive now.

[2ply]

Oh, and I don’t believe the Kings of Leon meant to be homophobic or knew much about Glee. The show is only in its second season and people who haven’t seen it tend to only know it as that show after American Idol, which probably contributes to some musicians reluctance to license their songs to the show.

[shy_guy]

Ryan Murphy is the absolute worst, so I couldn’t get too worked up even if Kings of Leon had held a Fred Phelps-style protest outside Murphy’s house. And I cant stand the Kings’ music. And I’m gay.

Glee is also the worst; I probably would’t let my music (if such a thing existed, which it very much does not) either.

[RandMcnally]

I can’t see that as homophobic. It sounded very much like, “Get that sand out of your vagina” type comment.

[Tom_Tildrum]

It’s not homophobic; it’s sexist. Nathan is saying, “the fact that you complain about stuff makes you sound like a woman,” and he means “you sound like a woman” as an insult.

[kenobi_65]

@2ply

Glee needs permission from the artist to perform their music because the show uses the songs in so many different mediums. In addition to the broadcast showing, there is also the streaming of episodes online and on DVD, and the Itunes sales, which all have different rules attached to whether an artist’s consent is needed.

Streaming music online isn’t cheap, the RIAA has seen to that, and shows like WKRP and In Living Color don’t include the music on their DVDs because the rights to do so were never secured when the shows originally ran and would be too expensive now.

IANAL (and certainly not an expert in these matters), but my understanding is, as An Gadai notes, there’s a difference between using someone’s recording, and recording the song yourself. My understanding (and I could be mistaken) is that the writers of a song only have the “right of refusal” to the first person to record a song (in other words, if I write a song, I can choose who’s going to be the first artist to record that song). Beyond that, if someone wants to pay the publisher (or whoever holds the publishing rights to a song), they can do a cover version of the song, and the writers can’t do anything about it.

It’s possible that the other aspects of what you mention (i.e., the song’s use in a TV show) make a difference, beyond just recording the song and simply releasing it as a song.

And, just to clarify, it’s not that they couldn’t get the rights to release WKRP on DVD with the original music recordings that were first used on the show; it’s that the rights to do so are prohibitively expensive.

[kenobi_65]

@2ply

Oh, and I don’t believe the Kings of Leon meant to be homophobic or knew much about Glee.

Yeah…while it’s possible that the guys in Kings of Leon don’t know much about Glee, I’d be pretty surprised if that’s the case. Glee has been dominating the top-seller charts since the show began; anyone who’s seriously involved in the pop music industry (and I think Kings of Leon count in this regard – their last two albums were in the top 5 in the U.S., and they’ve had 6 singles make the Top 40 Alternative chart in the U.S.) is either very aware of the impact Glee has had in the music industry, or is actively trying to not pay attention.

[Little_Nemo]

I agree with Tom Tildrum that Nathan’s remarks were more sexist than homophobic.

But I think overall Ryan Murphy came out of this looking worse than Kings of Leon. He took what should have been a routine business decision and turned it into a personal feud. He apparently feels that musicians should be honored by his requests and resents Kings of Leon for regarding Glee as just another television show.

[antonio107]

Ryan Murphy sounds like way more of the douche than the Kings of Leon. When did Glee=arts education? What a self-aggrandizing bastard.

[boytyperanma]

I don’t see it. Both parties seem a bit full of themselves. Homophobic no.

[Nava]

@kenobi_65

Beyond that, if someone wants to pay the publisher (or whoever holds the publishing rights to a song), they can do a cover version of the song, and the writers can’t do anything about it.

They can if they happen to also be the people holding the rights, something which more and more writers (specially those who sing their own songs) are doing.

I agree with Tom Tildrum et al: the comment is sexist but not homophobic. And if I was going to get my panties in a twist any time I encountered that level of sexism, I’d never have time to untwist them…

[Justin_Bailey]

@Little_Nemo

But I think overall Ryan Murphy came out of this looking worse than Kings of Leon. He took what should have been a routine business decision and turned it into a personal feud. He apparently feels that musicians should be honored by his requests and resents Kings of Leon for regarding Glee as just another television show.

This is pretty much it exactly. He’s bitched about people turning him down before and publcily berated Coldplay after they turned him down (only to later change their minds).

The whole cast seems to be a bunch of whiny babies. I remember a few months ago that Lea Michele (the main Glee girl) came out btiching and moaning about how Hollywood kept her out of things for years because they didn’t consider her beautiful enough. I think a slam at blonde airheads was thrown in as well.

For the record, this is the woman who made those comments.

Beyond the fact that a blind man could figure out she’s good looking, I did a little looking and it turns out Glee was one of the first things she ever auditioned for in Hollywood. Before that, she had a very decent career on Broadway and didn’t actually try to break into Hollywood yet.

There must be something in the water on that set.

[WordMan]

@Justin_Bailey

There must be something in the water on that set.

A Broadway/theater-inspired show with a lot of whining, bitching and back-stabbing going on around the production of it?

I’m shocked! Shocked, I tell you!

[Buckler_of_Swashing]

@Tom_Tildrum

It’s not homophobic; it’s sexist. Nathan is saying, “the fact that you complain about stuff makes you sound like a woman,” and he means “you sound like a woman” as an insult.

My thoughts exactly.

And gee, just when I was thinking maybe I ought to give Glee a chance after all Murphy went and turned me right off any of his work with his ridiculous reaction. What a douche.