A career is a lot like a person’s reputation : it takes a lifetime to build and only a matter of minutes to utterly obliterate. One false move and even the greatest stars can come crashing down to earth .
To help emphasize my point, I’ve compiled 10+ musicians who managed to ruin their career with one bad move. From hoedowns to stage-dives, they’ve done it all.
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Kodak Black
Kodak was one of the most promising young rappers in the mumble rap genre and his star power was quickly on the rise.
He spent the majority of last year in prison after being sentenced to 46 months for lying on documents in order to obtain a firearm.
Tekashi 69
Tekeshi 69 made so many career-ending bad moves that it’s difficult to point to just one as the culprit.
If I had to guess I would probably say that associating himself with known members of the Nine Trey Gangsta Bloods would rank high on his list.
Jesse Lacey
Jesse Lacey was the lead singer for the groundbreaking alt-rock/post-hardcore band, Brand New.
Back in 2017, he was accused of sexual misconduct by multiple young women. Jesse issued an apology but the band has yet to make any comment whatsoever since.
Miguel
Miguel doing an ill-conceived stage dive and landing on a poor unsuspecting fan’s head is no laughing matter.
She ended up suing the former R&B superstar for damages as well as lost wages due to her injury.
T-Pain
In the case of my man, Mr. Tallahassee Pain, it was plain old fashioned stagnation that caused his career to wane.
In 2019, T-Pain had to make a video issuing a public apology after canceling a planned tour due to poor ticket sales.
Guns N’ Roses
When you think of stereotypical rock n’ roll behavior, the real gritty “sex, drugs, and alcohol” type stuff, only one name comes to mind — Guns N’ Roses.
Infamous frontman Axel Rose became notorious for being late/not showing up for shows at all. After a while, fans grew tired of his antics.
Green Day
During a live television performance for iHeart Radio, lead-singer and frontman Billie Joe Armstrong had an absolute meltdown. His profanity-fueled rant culminated in Green Day smashing their guitars and walking off stage.
I grew up on this band and I have to admit — this was embarrassing.
Michelle Shocked
Michelle Shocked is far from a household name, and sadly she’ll likely never get the chance to ever become one.
During a live performance, Michelle was booed off the stage after making several homophobic slurs and anti-gay statements.
Janet Jackson
Janet Jackson was the victim of what became infamously known as Nipplegate.
During a Super Bowl performance, Janet experienced a wardrobe malfunction that left her breast exposed. She was fileted in the media for concocting what many believed to be a tasteless publicity stunt.
Eric Clapton
Kill your heroes, and do it quickly.
Otherwise, you might one day discover that the man who was once your greatest musical inspiration is really a hateful, ignorant, racist anti-masker who uses his celebrity to perpetuate hate speech.
Milli Vanilli
Younger readers may not immediately recognize the name Milli Vanilli. In the early ’90s, they were involved in arguably the greatest lip-sync scandal of all time.
They won the Grammy for ” Best New Artist ,” without actually singing a single note on their own album.
The Dixie Chicks
After expressing their frustration with George W. Bush and the U.S. invasion of Iraq, The Dixie Chicks (now The Chicks) were blacklisted. They were dropped from every single major radio station as well as their own label.
The song “Not Ready To Make Nice” details the events they went through.
Sinéad O’Connor
Sinéad managed to upset roughly a billion Christians in one single act of defiance.
During a live performance on SNL , Sinéad pulled out a picture of Pope John Paul II and quickly tore it to pieces for all the world to see.
Robin Thicke
Sorry, but I am most assuredly not sorry that Robin Thicke has been banished to the annals of music’s forgotten one-hit-wonders.
The only thing more tone-deaf than his “Blurred Lines” performance with Miley Cyrus was the half-baked apology album he recorded for his ex-wife.
Ashlee Simpson
When the wrong song began playing over the speakers during Ashlee’s ‘live’ SNL performance, she didn’t know what to do.
I’m not sure that a hoedown helped but I guess there was nothing she could have done to make matters any worse.
