“You’re black. Go away.”
That’s a common phrase I’ve heard in my nearly 20 years of being a rock critic in America. Before being a rock critic, I was a college radio host, a music director, and a show promoter. None of that mattered because my skin color was always shut out.
The only music critic who cared about my opinions was Tris McCall. They would always shout me out whenever they could, and I will always appreciate that. The rest of the music critics in New Jersey, however, rolled their eyes when they saw me at a show. One music critic who always rubbed me the wrong way is Jim Testa from Jersey Beat. Testa has been a music critic since the 80s for various publications. I ran into Testa on a couple of occasions at shows, and they always tried dodging me. When I checked Testa’s blog/podcast, I noticed that they’ve never spoken to one black rock musician or black person involved in the rock industry in the podcast’s 20-year history. Since they’d been writing about music before I was born, there’s a good chance they rarely spoke to black rock musicians.
It wasn’t just the music critics in New Jersey who didn’t seem to want black folk around; it was also the musicians. A vast majority of bands didn’t care about hearing black people talk about their music; they just wanted old white guys talking about it. When I moved to Los Angeles, I somehow thought things would be a bit better, but it’s not. I wrote about a lot of bands here, and most of them didn’t care because they only want to hear from white guys.
I’ve dealt with bad situations with publicists. Jamie Coletta of No Earbuds used to talk to me when they did PR for SideOneDummy. When they decided to do their own thing with No Earbuds, they kept in contact with every writer they worked with except me. I have to take it as “Not the black one” because I was probably the only black rock critic they’ve talked to. Coletta does PR for two black rock acts (Bartees Strange and Jhariah), and (shocker!) both acts rarely speak to black folk about their music with Coletta in charge. To have Coletta flaunt black rock acts in front of me knowing they would never let me talk to either of them is gross.
John Freeman of Freeman Promotions contacted me last year about covering one of their clients. They didn’t do their research on me because they simply got my email from someone else. When they asked what site I wrote for, I sent them a link and was denied instantly. I’ve covered endless concerts during my nearly 20 years as a rock critic, and this was the first time I’ve been rejected for a show pitched to me so quickly. I was furious because I’ve dealt with stuff like this constantly in other aspects. Freeman said that I was unprofessional in my outburst, but how could it be “unprofessional” when nobody wanted black people in rock journalism from the start? If Freeman wants unprofessionalism, they should look at all their favorite metal sites that refuse to hire black people. If Freeman wants unprofessionalism, they should look at their favorite music critics who intentionally erased black people out of rock history. Freeman can find an immense amount of unprofessionalism by scrolling through their friends list.
I’ve attended countless rock shows across the country, and one thing I’ve noticed is that there are no black people who have achieved success as rock photographers in America. Outside of the Afropunk Festival, I’ve always seen the same person shooting each show. Some of this can be pinned on black rock acts for never bringing black photographers on the road with them to uplift them. For a black person to be successful as a rock photographer in America, they need a portfolio, one million Instagram followers, at least five TikTok videos with 10 million views, and they had to have shot The Beatles during their last U.S. tour in 1966. White guys just need a portfolio.
The original title for the post was going to be “Rock journalism in America is racist (and black rock acts are somewhat to blame),” but that’s not SEO-friendly. June is Black Music Month, and before the What more do you people want?” crowd get mad, this has been an official thing for decades. Black rock acts don’t talk to their own folk for various reasons. Some of them get shielded from black critics from their publicists. Others simply see themselves as dark-skinned white guys. I’ve seen enough of both situations in the past 20 years.
UnityTX vocalist Jay Webster was headed over to Los Angeles and wanted to know if folks wanted to hang out. Since I live in the area, I chimed in hoping to possibly link up. Webster hung out with Holiday Kirk and various other white dudes and proceeded to cry about black folk not coming to their shows. Jason Aalon Butler from Fever 333/Letlive has dodged me (and potentially other black folk) for years. I’ve written reviews about Butler’s live shows and music for years, but they only cared about what white men said about their music. I’ve seen Fever 333 on a handful of occasions, and as expected, I was the only black person in the crowd. When Jason cried stuff about “Black power” on stage, I just stood there going, “Who are you talking to, sweetie?” Butler cries a lot about “Black power,” but their other half is always in the pit.
I wrote about Cold Gawd, and their vocalist Matthew Wainwright didn’t care one bit. Holiday Kirk simply uploaded their music video on Twitter, and they were backstage hanging out with the band at one of their shows. I never got an invite to see them once. Like the other folks mention, Matthew probably cries about black folk not coming to see the band despite ignoring us.
For those unaware of Holiday Kirk, they founded the popular Twitter account crazy ass moments in nu-metal history. This account is basically featured in an ongoing lawsuit between music publishers and Twitter about constant uploads of copywritten material. Holiday Kirk once tried to get the Twitter account eligible for Ads Revenue Sharing, which meant they would make money from uploading copywritten material from bands behind their back.
It’s simple: If you don’t talk to us, then you don’t TALK to us. All of these black rock bands don’t talk to black folk in America about their music outside of (maybe) Afropunk. They’ll always do interviews with white guys going, “I hope black folks know they can do rock music, too” and such. We are not the audience for Alternative Press or any of these other rock publications in America. They don’t hire us. What makes this worse is that folks like Jason will hang out at the Alternative Press office and never ask why they don’t hire black people.
There’s the black rock band called The Paradox that went viral recently, and I’m here to tell you that they will never speak to black folk about their music outside of (maybe) Afropunk. They will dodge folks who look like me and proceed to cry about black people not coming to their shows or listening to their music. I was being called slurs and being questioned constantly as a young rock critic in America when some of these black rock acts were at the zoo during a school field trip in kindergarten.
When I say “(maybe) Afropunk”, some publicists have skipped letting their black rock acts speak to Afropunk. Publicists will always allow black rock acts to speak to Afropunk because that’s their quota. I can’t get a word with these bands because I don’t write for Afropunk. I’m here to tell you that you can have Afropunk, myself, and any other black-owned rock websites in America exist at the same time, and you can have your clients talk to all of us.
These black rock acts are basically pulling Lenny Kravitz nonsense. For those unaware, a couple of years ago, Lenny Kravitz asked why black folks don’t write about their music. Nearly every black music journalist under the sun came together to say, “Because your white publicists ignored all of our pitches, our reviews, and our articles about you for decades.” Kravitz’s response was basically, “Yeah. I paid them to do that.”
After writing for various publications, I started my own music and gaming site called MP3s and NPCs (aka this exact publication). While I’ve had fun covering major gaming and anime conventions across the country, there are times where I feel like the site would’ve been a bigger deal if a white guy ran in. Back in May, Activision held a special Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 event at El Rey Theatre. I never got an invite to cover the event because why would a Los Angeles-based music and gaming publication be allowed to cover a music and gaming event in Los Angeles? Again, if a white guy with 200 followers ran this site, they would’ve been invited easily, and they probably were. In fact, they would’ve been on Kinda Funny, jumped on endless podcasts, and more.
Aside from running a music and gaming publication, I also run a YouTube channel called Black Man Talks Rock because I have to do a zillion things to prove I exist in this space. I also ran a TikTok account also called Black Man Talks Rock, but TikTok permanently banned my account after posting the same intro video I posted on YouTube. The banning was mainly because of the username because apparently black people aren’t allowed to talk about rock music on that platform.
A lot of this frustration can also be aimed at TikTok, where some black folk have earned a major following by simply dancing to rock music. Nick Harrison aka mrprofessor318 has accumulated millions of followers from doing this, which unfortunately inspired others to do the same. Harrison got to hang out with Pop Evil because they danced to one of their songs on TikTok. If a black rock critic in America wrote a 1,000-word review of Pop Evil’s record, the band and their record label wouldn’t care.
Because of TikTok and people like mrprofessor318, black people like myself have a much harder time being taken seriously as rock critics in America. They only want to see us dancing. Music festivals like Cruel World Festival and Aftershock Festival have never allowed black folk in as press, but they’d let us in if we accumulated a following from dancing to rock music. They would gladly share a clip of a black person shaking their butt at their festival instead of a 1,000-word review of their event written by a black person. Meanwhile, white guys can just walk on in with little problem.
Metal & Coffee is a black TikTokker who gained a big following talking about metal, but the metal labels who enjoy their content don’t care about black people. They just see someone with a large following and decide to latch onto them. Metal & Coffee has to take a hard L for doing stuff with The Needle Drop, though. Anthony Fantano makes more money talking about black music than black music critics. Black-owned music publications are dying left and right because everyone would rather listen to folks like Fantano and No Jumper aka Mr. I Am Hip Hop. You Shall Respect Me Or Else aka Adam22 discuss black music.
I wouldn’t be in this scenario if rock publications in America hired black people as critics. If only we had as many black people as rock critics as we somehow have a plethora of white guys as editor-in-chief/top critics of black music. Consequence of Sound hired me as a freelance writer years ago and never let me write about anything. They never pitched me anything or accepted my pitches. They just hired me and yelled, “Look! We have a black person talking about rock now! Look! A black!” That’s why Consequence of Sound and every rock publication in America can rot. If I asked someone to name 10 black rock critics in America who were hired by Rolling Stone, Billboard, and other major publications over the past 40 years to interview artists like Dave Grohl, Roger Daltrey, and Corey Taylor, they couldn’t. No one could because they don’t exist.
I don’t read rock journalism because none of these rock critics in America like Dan Ozzi or Ian Cohen would let a black person sit at the table. When I mention “sit at the table,” people always point out black rock acts being interviewed, and that’s not what I’m talking about. When I say “sit at the table,” I mean let black people be the interviewers. Invite black people to discussions about specific trends in rock or certain albums/eras. That doesn’t happen in America because these critics and publications think we’re unintelligent.
This happens with radio as well. I contacted Idobi Radio a few times about what it would take to run a music and gaming show on their lineup but got no response. I checked their schedule and saw they had a pop culture show with two black people as co-hosts. I said to myself, “I guess they went over their quota for black people at Idobi Radio, so they won’t be having another black person hosting there for another decade.” Rock stations across America talk about diversity and such, but the only diverse thing about their staff is the different hair styles all the white guys have.
Black people in America need to have over 100,000 followers to prove we exist in rock music while white guys just have to exist. If comedian Shapel Lacey wasn’t in a band, they would still get invited on rock podcasts because of their following. Meanwhile, I’ve never been invited to do one podcast despite writing about rock music for almost 20 years. I’ve interviewed bands such as The Gaslight Anthem, Title Fight, and Jimmy Eat World, but it means nothing because I don’t have 100,000 followers. I’ve covered a country music festival in New York City, Electric Daisy Carnival, and multiple Warped Tours in the past, but it means nothing because of my following. I booked bands like Title Fight, Set It Off, and Tigers Jaw in the past, but it means nothing because I lack a legit following.
It’s no longer “You’re black. Go away.” It’s now, “You’re black. You need 100,000 followers for us to care about you.” Stuff like that has destroyed my mental state. On the subject of numbers, The Paradox needed about two million followers on Instagram and TikTok combined to get the same level of opportunities a band of white guys would get with only 25,000 followers. Again, black people have to do so much extra stuff to prove we belong here.
A few years ago, Revolver Magazine had Eric Andre interview Mike Patton as their cover story. When I saw this, I immediately said to myself, “The only way Revolver Magazine would let black folk sit at the table is if they have millions of followers and a successful TV show.” Revolver Magazine and every other rock publication would leap at the chance to have Kai Cenat interview a rock band, but they would never actually hire a black rock critic.
My writing has been damaged by all of this as well. It’s hard to write a nice review knowing it wouldn’t matter. Again, a black person could write a 1,000-word review, and it would get a simple thumbs up from a publicist or be ignored by the artist and/or publicist. A white guy could write a 100-word review, and that article would get shared constantly. I passed on writing a “Best of 2024” music article because I knew my opinions about rock music don’t matter. I probably won’t do a “Best of 2025 So Far” article for the same reason.
If you’re reading this and decide to finally reach out to me for something, don’t. I’ve learned that black people don’t matter in rock music in America. I’d have to move to the U.K. to see success as a rock critic. Black people are interviewing Metallica and Slipknot in the U.K. That’s impossible to do in America. The U.K. scene has two black rock bands (Nova Twins and ALT BLK ERA) who had albums debuting at number one on the Rock charts in their country; ALT BLK ERA’s debut album topped the Rock charts there. Magnolia Park could drop 10 albums on Epitaph Records, and none of them would chart here because their label doesn’t care about them enough.
I’m gonna end things with one piece of advice to black folk on TikTok or whatever social media platform: If you’re thinking about dancing to a new Sleep Token song or whatever for likes, don’t. Open a music blog instead. Start a YouTube channel discussing rock music. Start a rock podcast. Let them know that black people can ACTUALLY talk about THEIR precious music. When you do the dancing stuff, it hurts folks like me. It gives people the impression that it’s the only thing black people know how to do, and it’s not. Again, we’ve had a zillion white guys as hip-hop critics in America for the past 40 years, but every time I turned around, I didn’t see someone looking like me as a rock critic. It’s time to change that.
