Fake news? ‘Nightline’ story made by black reporter falsely claims Guetta to being responsible in bringing house music to the US
Photo above: Snapshot of ABC/Nightline
Chicago should be mad right now. Really.
The city that has become synonymous with blues and gospel is also home to house music. It’s where it all begun. With Frankie Knuckles taking his Larry Levan nightlife inspiration to the legendary quarters of the late ’70’s-early ’80’s Warehouse club (where “house” literally got its name from). And the city got totally disrespected on prime time last night with a news segment on ABC’s Nightline led by news correspondent Zachary Kiesch that got all the facts wrong about house music.
And people are fuming.
One outraged person commented: “What kind of Christoper Columbus shit is this?”
No offense to David Guetta, a very talented French DJ who has brought great value to the world of EDM. HiFi has covered Guetta as a standalone artist and being the force behind a number of mega hits for artists like Rihanna, Sia, Nicki Minaj, the Black Eyed Peas and dozens more, but this story was so full of incorrect material and exaggerated fluff.
The main headline of the video now trending on social media coming from the actual video report states “How David Guetta helped bring house music to the US and made his rise to the top.”
Apparently, the headline was skewered by some drunk or naive editor, but deep in the piece (which hardly even uttered the term “house music”) it erroneously credited Guetta as the grandfather of electronic dance music. Maybe sympathetic to the subject, or possibly trying to come up with something eye-popping to readers, this too is journalistic hyperbole.
Inside the video, Guetta, 50, is asked about his beginnings as a young untapped DJ in France and eventual rise in the music industry. These are the DJ’s words: “I started, you know, giving the flyers myself on the beach, putting up the posters myself and promoting, going up to people and saying there’s a new type of msucia nd it’s called house music and it’s crazy and it’s gonna be a revolution.”
For the record, house music was birth in the US, and has always been a vital part of dance and pop culture since it blossomed from the ’80’s underground to mainstream with raging hit records from Black Box, Crystal Waters, CeCe Peniston, C+C Music Factory and hundreds more. And Guetta wasn’t the first DJ to do it. Pillars like the aforementioned Knuckles, Todd Terry, Farley Jackmaster Funk, Steve “Silk” Hurley, David Morales and Masters at Work were doing house in the US well before Guetta’s arrival. Yes, he’s selling millions of singles using traces of house, but if you wanted to be technical, Guetta is more synth-pop and electro-pop than house.
We did a little digging on Kiesch and discovered that he’s practically new to the ABC News team. Deadline.com reported that he was added to the force at the top of the year, making the move from New York affiliate WNYW.
Kiesch has worked for WNYW for the past two years, covering stories ranging from the Chelsea terror attacks, to Pope Francis’ visit to America and the 2016 Presidential election. Prior to WNYW he was a reporter for Fox 5 and WRC in Washington.
His reporting has focused on civil rights issues, criminal justice reform, education and housing. He earned an Emmy nomination in 2016 for his report on the relationship between communities of color and the police.
Zac Kiesch
But nowhere in their coverage of his journalistic background is there any credence to music. Not a drop of journalism dedicated to music at all. Clearly, they got the wrong dude to follow Guetta around. And, despite being a black man himself, Kiesch was totally the wrong person to turn Guetta into a modern-day Christoper Columbus. Dude literally gave Guetta a gentrification pass with house music, and did it right smack in our faces. He went past “Go!” and collected $200 while at it.
If there ever was evidence of Trump’s “fake news” claim, this would be the time to make the call.
Guetta is talented and he may be a raging sensation at his Vegas residency where non-rhythmic white dudes are forking up their daddy’s savings at posh nightclubs nightly, but he ain’t what ABC is dubbing him.
UPDATE: It looks like ABC is trying to change the headline in light of all of the negative feedback and uproar. In some places of the video, the headline reads: “David Guetta on his latest album ‘7’ and his rise to the top.” No word from editors yet on the blowback.
UPDATE – 10/22, 11:55 pm — So, it looks like the original video and post from ABC News – Nightline has been removed entirely. As if it never happened. We call damage control. Yeah. Because the heat was so hot underneath Guetta and his management’s shoes since the fluff piece went live. It even caused Guetta to put out a statement on social media via Facebook and Instagram. Read it for yourself:
And you know what’s sad: Dude still doesn’t get it. The “controversy” he speaks of was all about that article, that single report ABC made. They were totally wrong and he failed to say it. But thanks for the quick lesson on the origins of house music.
Still, no statement from ABC or from the failed reporter.