[Twitter post by the victim]
https://twitter.com/megans_law/status/702637471717335041
[Press statement from his band]
VERY SAD ANNOUNCEMENT
A few hours ago, my good friend Megan published her account of sexual misconduct against her by my Psalm Zero bandmate Andrew Hock. The Twitter link of her account is attached below. She told me about it this past Sunday, the morning after it happened, and I’ve been waiting for her to speak publicly about it before doing so myself. This kind of thing is extremely sensitive and messy, so my statement will necessarily be long-winded. However, despite the inherent complexity of the issues, three main things have been extremely easy for me to decide immediately:
1. I believe Megan 100%.
2. I won’t be working with Andrew in any capacity in the future, or speaking to him at all, effective immediately.
3. Psalm Zero will continue without Andrew.
As for my trust in the accuracy of Megan’s account, this isn’t simply because statistically women tend not to lie about these things. There’s that. But it’s also because I’ve known Megan personally for years, and lying or exaggerating something like this in order to hurt Andrew is just not something I could possibly imagine her doing. She has shown Andrew nothing but total support in the past, both as a musician and as a friend. Megan is tough as nails and she doesn’t call me in tears on a Sunday morning over nothing. “Oversensitivity” is not one of her problems. Furthermore, Andrew’s initial “side of the story” (as he related to me in a barrage of texts to which I didn’t reply) barely even contradicted Megan’s account. He essentially said what she said, minus the gross details, plus apologizing, as well as some rationalizing which I seriously found just as creepy as his actions themselves. I’ve been told that since then he has shifted his story around, but I’ve stopped listening.
As for my severing all ties with Andrew, I want to be as clear and fair as possible here. I don’t view the world in strict moral black-and-white, so my mind isn’t wrestling with the dissonance of having previously thought of Andrew as a Good Guy but now suddenly feeling like I have to view him as a Monster. He wasn’t a Good Guy before, and he’s not a Monster now. He’s been a fucked up, unstable, human being the whole time. I’ve consistently found him to be deeply self-centered and competitive (yes, more than me) and seriously lacking in a certain basic awareness of how his actions affect other people. But none of it struck me as having a sexually inappropriate quality, until this recent incident. It was always the kind of stuff I felt I could just deal with personally with him, in order to keep our musical collaboration going. I’ve also shared with Andrew a truly deep feeling of kinship based in our profound engagement with music, our shared sense of dark humor, depression, and frankly, our shared drug problems. There has always been a layer of real love and camaraderie in our relationship, a certain shared worldview. At the same time, there has also always been another layer which is that, when he’s talking about something other than music, I disregard about 90% of what comes out of his mouth. I’ve forgiven Andrew for endless personal affronts to me over the years, and to be fair, he’s forgiven me for some serious bullshit between us as well. But just because he’s a human being doesn’t mean I have to have anything to do with him. This isn’t about demonizing or stigmatizing Andrew so I can feel morally superior. It’s simply that certain behavior is fucked up enough for me to cut a person out of my life, and to tell everyone why.
I’m not about to run around the whole scene cutting off anyone who’s still friends with him or still works with him, on the grounds that they’re “enabling an Abuser”. I’m not telling anyone what to do, I’m just saying what I’m doing. I’m not really even telling anyone what to think about it, except for this one basic thing: you should believe Megan’s account. That’s the only thing I’m literally telling people to think. Believe her story, and then make up your own mind about what that means to you.
As for ejecting Andrew from Psalm Zero, the timing is pretty inconvenient, considering that we just finished recording our new album. Currently booked live shows for April and May will be canceled. Touring plans surrounding the record are obviously up in the air, although definitely not out of the question. Since Andrew handled so much of the business side of Psalm Zero, it seems possible that some of the band’s professional network may be compromised by his dismissal. But since on a purely musical level, Psalm Zero has been primarily my vision from day one, the idea of continuing the project without Andrew isn’t seriously troubling to me, despite all of his fantastic musical input.
Right now there’s a ton of discussion online about sexual assault and harassment, especially in music scenes, and all the surrounding politics and power issues. I absolutely fully support that discussion in general, but that’s just not even where I’m trying to take this post. I want to be clear that this isn’t about me personally covering my ass out of fear of the court of public opinion. If for some reason I doubted Megan’s story, or if deep down I accepted Andrew’s behavior, then I would absolutely stand by him, whatever the cost. But I don’t, so fuck him.
Thanks for reading.
r 
