From John Lennon's physically abusive tendencies drawing public attention to Hollywood's sexual misconduct investigations of 2017, several die-hard consumers found their idols revealed as rather nasty people, beginning to question their own morality in terms of continuing to consume their art. This is often simplified to "separating the art from the artist," but often entertains more factors that bind the artist to their work and, subsequently, the consumer.

Though it's much easier to wipe away the work of actors and comedians, and simply fill this void with similar work, one medium doesn't quite work this way: music. For a fan to denounce one of their favorite musicians would be an utter lie, as an affinity for music is just as cerebral as a preference of foods. It's a pallet, and we can't adjust our pallets to be politically correct.

This is quite a broad issue, I'm aware, and others have put into context much better than I'll ever be able to. In fact, I didn't concern myself with the issue the issue of scummy behavior in the entertainment industry until last November, when I was forced to question my own morality. Since I discovered their visceral, cathartic album "The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me," I became an avid fan of the Brand New, a lyrically brilliant rock band.

Over the course of my formative teenage years, Brand New became a very important band to me, prompting me to acquire all of their albums and a great deal of merchandise, and even being so bold to tattoo the lyrics to their 2003 hit, "The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows," on my forearms. Last year was pretty significant for Brand New, in that it quite literally saw them at the highest and lowest points of their career in a matter of months.

It began in August, when a previously dormant Brand New leaked their final album, "Science Fiction," to their Youtube channel, breaking a silence that lasted from 2009 to 2017. As one would expect, fans were ecstatic, and I was no exception. What we already knew would be Brand New's final album was soon regarded as much more than a proper farewell. The term "masterpiece" became inescapable from the mouths of critics and fans alike, and the album rose to the 1st place on the Billboard Top 100 shortly after a release.

While I found songs like "Waste" and "Batter Up" to be unnecessarily sentimental tunes built off of blanket statements, I can't help but consider the rich, emotional roller coaster, "Same Logic/Teeth" to be one of their most anthemic songs yet, nor can I deny that the biblical allusions of "Can't Get It Out" are a perfect way to illustrate Brand new's career. Regardless of the extent of the praise it received, "Science Fiction" was a triumph.

With the release of "Science Fiction" came the announcement of their final tour, one I was determined to attend. The tickets sold out within a week, but I wasn't above buying from extortionists if that's what it had taken. Unfortunately, that's what it took, costing me 400 dollars. In retrospect, I realized that was reckless, but the show was definitely worth it. Nothing could be traded for the surreal experience Brand New had to offer, which varied from the distorted, primal fury of "Degausser" and "You Won't Know" to the subtle despondence of "Lit me Up" and wistful acoustic adaptation of one of their earliest tracks, "Soco Amaretto Lime."

Every emotion felt by fans was mutual that day, with total strangers singing the quintessential "Okay I Believe You, But My Tommy Gun Don't" in unison as we exited the venue. I'll never forget that last detail, nor will I forget the pride I felt after the concert, but that's no longer the first thing to come to mind when I think of Brand New.

Less than a month later the concert, I watched intently as Brand New fell from grace. Among the many celebrities accused of sexual misconduct by alleged victims, Brand New's primary songwriter, Jesse Lacey, was soon added to the list. According to a respondent on a Facebook thread, Lacey was responsible for grooming an underage girl on social media in the early 2000s. This information was soon made public by online music articles, and one of these articles soon found its way to me.

It was a punch to the solar plexus to someone literally wearing Jesse's words on their arms, and I constantly checked my phone, hoping this information would be debunked by Jesse himself. What scared me the most, though, were the numerous responses that rose to relevancy accusing him of similar misconduct. He confessed that these allegations were true a day after they surfaced, and I had no clue how to react. I chose, instead, to observe how Brand New's passionate fanbase reacted.

As I expected, the fanbase was emotionally split by Lacey's actions. In a more honorable manner, many fans decided to drop Brand New entirely, deleting fan accounts from the internet or denouncing their allegiance to the band in heart-wrenching posts in support of the victims. This quickly turned to hate, and the phrase "screw Jesse Lacey" became very common in the comment sections of Brand New's online material.

Among this is the usage of Brand New quotes like "have a couple drinks and drive yourself home. I hope there's ice on all the roads," redirected at Lacey. While I found the hatred to be understandable, I can't help but think that some of these former fans may have been wailing "Tommy Gun" the prior month.

The abrupt hatred may have been excessive, and maybe fans who responded that way were wrong, I thought, but the opposite reaction was just as popular and simply defied logic. Before Lacey confessed, some die-hard followers shut off their minds to his possible guilt and chose to attack the victim, claiming she was lying to antagonize him. Ridiculously enough, a substantial chunk of these fans continue to preach this notion, though Lacey has explicitly confessed to the allegations.

Upon further investigation of these profiles, I found these individuals digging even further holes, with one particularly stubborn devotee was so bold to claim that one needs to have a high IQ to understand Lacey's lyricism and that the media only brought Brand New down because their music was so enlightening.

Needless to say, I didn't choose to take this stance, but I also understood that I couldn't drop the band completely. Brand New was very important to me for a long time, and to deny that would be a lie. I couldn't shake my connection to their music, nor could I repress the euphoria I felt at the concert a month before, so I questioned my own morality: What did my affinity for Brand New say about me?

I still can't answer this, and I've decided that my stance on the matter wouldn't alter my musical palette, something the music of Brand New is inscribed into. Because of this, I didn't jump to conclusions and decided to look into the musical timeline of Brand New, only to find a distinct change in tone, where sexual and narcissistic themes were replaced by more self-deprecating, abstract ones.

According to the victim's narrative, the abuse occurred in the early 2000s, which is something I have no trouble believing after examining Jesse's lyrics and demeanor around the time. Brand New's debut record, "Your Favorite Weapon," was packed with sexually charged angst, conceited anger, and breakups, all of which paint the picture of a cocky youth prone to several one-night stands. Give that kid the power of stardom, as Brand New was granted, and he's bound to take advantage of it.

By the time "Deja Entendu," their sophomore record, heightened them to the position of modern emo pioneers, Lacey was full of himself, having developed the stage presence of moaning, mysterious pop-punk Morrissey. This new disposition screamed sexual tension, and an ambition to get whatever he wanted. It was at the height of this era that Brand New's lyrics were full of red flags.

With Lacey's misconduct fresh in my mind, I can't help but find "Deja Entendu" menacing, with "The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows" standing as the only song not filled with Lacey's deviant subtleties. These hints can be broken down into two subcategories, with few songs actually combining the two: Jesse's massive ego and sexual urgency. The former of these themes are sprinkled through the lens of fame in tracks like "I Will Play My Game Beneath the Spin Light" and "Good Thing To Know If I Ever Need Attention All I Have To Do Is Die," but most profoundly disturbing in "Okay I Believe You, But My Tommy Gun Don't." This track slowly layers itself as Jesse gloats over his talents and sainthood, opening the song by croons the warning, "I am heaven sent, don't you dare forget." While the sexual tension in Deja varies from dark and vulnerable in the brooding anti-dance song, "Sic Transit Gloria," to fluid and pure in the albums' opening track, "Tautou," no song embodies Jesse's ego and urges more than "Me vs. Maradona vs. Elvis," which explicitly recites his predatory behavior in a song just too taunting to read as a proper confession.

Fortunately for the listener, and parallel to the victim's account of Lacey ceasing with the abuse, Brand New's themes changed drastically after "Deja," and the mysterious, post-punk guise he had built was dropped. The release of 2006's "The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me" saw a very different band with a more self-aware and contemplative dynamic. The themes present in Deja were completely absent, and Lacey took it upon himself to warn the audience that he was nobody to be respected, all but slicing open his own throat on the spiritually dissonant record.

Something I caught onto when revisiting "Devil and God" was that he reeked with guilt throughout the album, and most notably in "You Won't Know," a screamed, 6-minute plea to his victim forgive him as a proverbial mob of enraged fathers gather to publicly execute. This is a song whose context has been heavily disputed, but the allegations make it so the aforementioned image comes up whenever I hear "hey, hey, mr. hangman, go get your rope."

Along with the abstract lyrics of "Daisy" paving the way for years of near inactivity for Brand New, I find the pattern of Brand New's career to be reflective of Lacey's festering guilt. Everything following "Deja Entendu" suggests that Lacey went through an intense period of change, and became much more self-aware and remorseful, even if the changes he made weren't based on the specific events that leaked last year. With this in mind, "Science Fiction" saw a band finally confident enough to put out art again, and much older, music wiser Jesse Lacey.

The issue, however, is that he never paid for this in the eyes of his victims, so the issue still remained, buried under years of Lacey's evolution and obscurity. This makes it necessary, but equally tragic that Lacey had to finally face this on the last leg of his career. As he warned listeners a decade before, his bright truly was too slight to hold back all his dark, and he was buried by a terrible mistake he made. That's the legacy of Brand New, regardless of an individual fan's opinion.

It's been a few months since Lacey confessed to the allegations and I came to the conclusions I mentioned above, but how have I adjusted to this news, having loved the band for so long? I really left it with the answers I found in "Deja" and "The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me," and stopped supporting the band from there. I say supporting rather than listening because I chose not to frivolously sport Brand New T-shirts in public, discuss their lyrics, or buy any new variations of their records, but can never remove them from my mental playlist.

There have been many nights since where I could only find clarity in songs like "Jesus Christ," "Sowing Season," and "The Archers' Bows Have Broken." While I can refrain from supporting the band further, to deny that their mid-career records hit me harder than the work of anything else would be dishonest. The tattoos will remain on my arm, and the lyrics will remain important to me, though I may no longer be so inclined to volunteer that information.