Texas-born, Berlin-based producer Lotic wrote a scathing takedown of the PC Music collective today after one of its members, singer-producer GFOTY, incited controversy with a racist comment. GFOTY reviewed England’s Field Day festival for Noisey via a series of text message screenshots, and in one of them — since removed from the original story — she described Malian kora players Toumani & Sidiki Diabaté as “Bombay Bicycle Club blacked up.” In a post on Facebook, Lotic addressed GFOTY’s comments plus last week’s anti-gay Facebook rant from producer Ten Walls, whose remarks got him dropped from a number of festivals. Lotic’s statement decries PC Music as shallow, insubstantial, and insincere and calls out the press for giving voice to straight white males at the expense of queer voices and people of color. Key parenthetical: “there’s nothing brave about not showing your face and nothing exciting about having nothing real to say.”

UPDATE: GFOTY and PC Music have offered apologies.

I was actually trying to make a joke about appropriation, but I fucked up and it wasn't funny. I’m sorry.

— GFOTY (@GFOTY) June 8, 2015

I know I push buttons, but I've gone too far this time. I was being really naive, and for that I take full responsibility.

— GFOTY (@GFOTY) June 8, 2015

We are extremely disappointed by the completely inexcusable comments made by GFOTY.

— PC Music (@pcmus) June 9, 2015

The comments do not reflect the views of the label, or our other artists.

— PC Music (@pcmus) June 9, 2015

They do not reflect our ethos to create an inclusive musical environment and community of people from all backgrounds.

— PC Music (@pcmus) June 9, 2015

Here’s Lotic’s full message:

“i told you” isn’t even the right response to this. like, i understand that white people don’t feel like they have ‘tribal’ music or any ‘real culture’ in general, but to me this is more a result of press/club culture over-intellectualizing music and being too curious about ‘mysterious’ producers, congratulating mediocrity and creating false heroes because we’re so desperate to save our clubs. and i get it.

but. you can congratulate pc music et al. for their mystery and ‘clever’ use of ‘irony’ or you can just investigate and realize that it’s merely a vapid art project by a handful of rich kids (mostly male, with female avatars btw) that’s diluting the club pool and that your making excuses for their boring music is part of the problem. you actually don’t have to pretend that anything that’s even vaguely non-conforming is good or cool?

there is so much music being made by incredibly talented queers and people of color that it’s almost always comical to read headlines about straight white musicians. i personally never click on them, and i would actually bet money (of which i have little) that no other queer/poc gave a shit about pc music or ten walls until, like, today. and that’s because, for some people, music is still a medium reserved for genuine expressions of emotion or feeling (the last one?), as opposed to a way to explore a concept.

this, and the ten walls incident, is upsetting, but there is absolutely nothing surprising about either incident to anyone that has a real investment in protecting these spaces, to anyone who NEEDS these spaces in order to survive. not monetarily, but NEED in terms of staying sane, in terms of exploring themselves, in terms of being free and escaping the world and the status quo, even if just for a night.

and i want to be clear that i’m not vehemently against conceptual music. i think it’s important and has its place. concepts help us keep our bigger projects on track. everyone loves a new perspective! but ‘conceptual’ and ‘mysterious’ usually turn out to be an abdication of responsibility (there’s nothing brave about not showing your face and nothing exciting about having nothing real to say). and we can’t be afraid of emotional or confrontational music. since when has music not been political? since when have we not turned to music when we need uplifting or comfort?

really sorry to get so dramatically romantic and i usually just channel my frustrations into my own music but i’m actually just *not having it* in general right now and neither should you and i’m upset that we all just kind of allowed these people to ‘blow up’ based on hardly anything. it’s a fucking distraction.

also, who doesn’t know who toumani diabaté is?! and anal is amazing?!?

anyway *opens ableton*