I decided in December 2024 that I should finally give the band Brand New a shot, because enough time had passed that I felt I had sufficiently evaluated how Jesse Lacey’s misdeeds revealed in 2017 should affect my feelings on the band and their work. But then it was confirmed a few months later that the group would be returning to touring and potentially releasing material, and, combined with someone else coming forward with their own story (which, while again unsettling, didn’t reveal any behavior patterns we didn’t already know about), I needed to process things again in real-time. What follows is a running log of some things I posted on the group’s last.fm shoutbox (some of these I deleted) and potentially some bits restricted to here.

5 January 2025 (before the reunion):

I put off getting into them for a while bc of the creepy stuff, but honestly knowing that stuff makes the lyrics more interesting and complex. Maybe Jesse’s apology post wasn’t up to many peoples’ standards but I feel like it’s really clear through many of the songs that he did feel bad about what he did/was doing. Lotta people will say you shouldn’t provide support at all but imo he’s someone who was open about his issues, maybe to a degree that maybe isn’t as transparent as people would like but I don’t see him as pure evil and rather as someone who was/is deeply troubled, and hurt people, and made art out of that

7 April 2025:

Tbh the more I think about it I’m really conflicted on them coming back. I think it really depends on how Jesse presents himself to the public in the coming time. If he doesn’t again address and more specifically acknowledge his past wrongs it feels weird to just pretend it didn’t happen. To me understanding the grooming behavior is a key element to a modern understanding of his lyrics and the role guilt and feelings of being wrong play out on them, and if everyone just pretends none of this happened it feels disingenuous and off-putting.

I don’t think anything he does will be able to make up for the damage done to the victims, but his old apology, which I think was okay when he stepped out of the spotlight, isn’t enough if he’s getting a second chance at being in the public eye again

(Idk I just have a hard time balancing the conflicting feelings of on the one hand a talented musician/lyricist of self hatred and on the other the fact that his self hatred stems from gross stuff)

10 April 2025 (3 days later):

For whatever it’s worth I haven’t listened to BN since writing this, not on principle but just for emotional reasons. It stemmed a lot from the most recent allegations which really don’t change much in that it’s the same things we already knew were happening, but hearing it reiterated does make you consider the reality again. My fundamental feelings didn’t shift much either, but it brings back the discomfort that led me away from digging into science fiction when the allegations first came out. All this said, I do find it really confusing why these actions seem to stick to Jesse but other people in the same genre get a pass. Maybe because the one I’m specifically thinking of wasn’t the singer? [talking about fall out boy] Idk just feels like culture randomly decides which shitheads get called out for being shitheads

Oh and the one I feel comfortable naming, that damn new Falling in Reverse album gets radio airplay but the same station will only play TBS as “Long Island’s own” (maybe they took sides in the beef but idk all of the members of BN are from Long Island and TBS not so)

11 April 2025 (1 day later):

I deleted my previous long rambling thing abt my complex feelings abt the band coming back but now framing some songs through the lens of jesse’s actions, some of the songs become really interesting (“Me vs Maradonna vs Elvis” and “You Won’t Know” in particular)… If we approach the work of Brand New from a less parasocial, more detached perspective and as the work of an artist with a very troubled and problematic personal life (Jesse himself said that MvMvE was about fear of basically what happened in 2017) it becomes easier to process. A lot will depend on how things are addressed going forward (even if there isn’t a huge deal made about a follow up, more in depth apology at least not a heel-turn and dismissal/denial of prior claims). Maybe its my English degree talking tho idk

(Blog-only: I just listened to a few songs and that was what sparked those thoughts.)