Country radio stations are quickly dropping Morgan Wallen from their playlists after the singer was recorded using a racial slur after a night out.
Variety magazine reported late last night. that Atlanta-based Cumulus Media sent out a memo pulling Wallen’s music off its radio stations.
According to Variety, Cumulus sent a directive to the program directors of its 400-plus stations with the header “MORGAN WALLEN — EXTREMELY IMPORTANT.” The message read: “Team, unfortunately country music star Morgan Wallen was captured on video Sunday evening using a racial slur. Effective immediately we request that all of Morgan Wallen’s music be removed from our playlists without exception. More to follow.”
Brian Phillips, executive vice president for content for Cumulus, said in a text he’s not sure how long the ban will last. Cumulus owns numerous country stations nationwide and locally oversees New Country 101.5.
On Wednesday, IHeartMedia, Entercom, SiriusXM and Pandora all followed suit.
Wallen and a group of friends returned to Wallen’s house around midnight Sunday, TMZ first reported, and began honking horns and shouting. That apparently caught the attention of neighbors, who began to record the country star.
As Wallen walked up his driveway, the video shows, he hurled the racial slur and other profanities.
In a statement Tuesday night, Wallen apologized: “I’m embarrassed and sorry. I used an unacceptable and inappropriate racial slur that I wish I could take back. There are no excuses to use this type of language, ever. I want to sincerely apologize for using the word. I promise to do better.”
Wallen is one of the hottest country artists in the country with “Dangerous: The Double Album” in its third week at No. 1 on the Billboard Top 200 album chart. He also broke country streaming records.
He’s had four consecutive No. 1 country airplay hits, according to Mediabase. His current single “7 Summers” is at No. 15 and was still rising as of yesterday.
In response to the brouhaha, Big Loud Records Wednesday suspended his contract though his records are still available for download or purchase. As of 2 p.m. EST Wednesday, he has nine songs on the top 100 on iTunes and 25 of the top 100 most streamed songs on Apple Music. In the meantime, CMT was scrubbing his performances from its website.
The last time Atlanta’s New Country played Wallen was at 4:16 a.m. Wednesday morning with his 2018 hit “Chasin’ You.” Over the past seven days, the station played him 97 times, about once every 103 minutes, according to Mediabase 24/7, which tracks radio airplay. He was the station’s fifth most played artist over that time period.
On rival station 94.9/The Bull, owned by iHeartMedia, Wallen was the fourth-most played artist the past week, behind only Luke Combs, Gabby Barrett and Blake Shelton. It last played a Wallen song at 2:54 a.m.
Among 17 country stations owned by Cumulus and tracked by Mediabase 24/7, Wallen was a core artist at every single station, averaging 100 spins per station this past week or 14 times a day.
The last time country radio suddenly stopped playing an artist was in 2003 when the Chicks (then called the Dixie Chicks) got into trouble during the run-up of the Iraq War. Lead singer Natalie Maines told a British concert audience she was ashamed that Pres. George W. Bush was from her home state of Texas. The backlash among country fans was intense and hundreds of radio stations dropped them.
At first, the Chicks apologized but later rescinded the apology. The trio never courted country radio again and released an album in 2006 called “Not Ready to Make Nice.”
This situation appears less fraught for Wallen.
The country music business has not had a lot of Black artists over the years. And its fan base is not all that diverse.
Black country singer MIckey Guyton on Twitter noted: " When I read comments saying “this is not who we are” I laugh because this is exactly who country music is. I’ve witnessed it for 10 gd years. You guys should just read some of the vile comments hurled at me on a daily basis. It’s a cold hard truth to face but it is the truth.”
But she showed empathy toward Wallen: “I do not believe in cancel culture. Watching anyone fall from grace is a terrible thing to see. People must all be given a chance to change. Morgan must feel the weight of his words but completely throwing someone away is detrimental to anyone’s mental health.
Wallen made headlines in October when “Saturday Night Live” dropped him as musical guest because the singer was seen not following coronavirus protocols.
He was invited back to perform on “SNL” in December.
Social media was quick to respond to the incident.
But not everyone is ready to write Wallen off.
