In an interview with Hardknock TV, Day26 criticized Donnie Klang for remarks he made on the finale of the second part of the third season of Making the Band 4. Specifically, his comments about Day26 having more TV time. I pulled the footage of the finale and watched this part of the show. Here is the exchange between Sway, the show's host, and Donnie:


This doesn't seem all that bad, but it struck a nerve with the members of Day26. Mike especially had harsh words, repeatedly saying "father f*** you" in reference to Donnie. I don't really care about the context, but repeatedly saying that phrase as he does in the interview just isn't professional or mature and it casts the group in a bad light. In any case, though, between the mixture of laughter and silence from the others, they all share in the responsibility for this interview.

Que and Robert took turns, as well, with Que saying that it showed "a side of him that we didn't see," and Robert adding that "it's not a side that we didn't hear about before."

Willie, a bit more rationally, explained that they felt offended and that they certainly weren't trying to take all of the camera time. Brian didn't really weigh in, one way or the other. This plays out in part 2 of the interview (I've included the other two parts parts below, as well). This wasn't the only questionable part of the interview, but this is the portion that will make news and rightfully so.

(Warning: content in videos is not suitable for all audiences.)


Donnie Klang responded to the video, both with his own video and on his Twitter account. On Twitter, he wrote:


The video he posted (watch it below) is of him watching the interview and then briefly, and angrily, responding. Update: Donnie has pulled his video. Basically, most of it was him watching the part of the Day26 interview described above. And then, at the end of the clip, he spoke for approximately 20 seconds, saying things like "are you f****** kidding me?" There was also text displayed on the screen, over the video, saying "I can't believe Mike said that" or something to that extent, as well as "I'm jealous?"


Willie posted a trio of messages, apologizing for the interview and saying that they have "mad love" for Donnie.




I sent a tweet to Will myself and he responded:



It was nice of him to respond and I appreciate the approach he is taking to this situation, which is to take responsibility for it. Hopefully, this is over. As a fan, I would hope that they will talk, apologies will be made and they'll move on. But, a couple of things come to mind when watching the interview clip.

Not to pile on, since Willie acknowledged it was "stupid," but what are they doing? It's not like they are brand new to this anymore. Even if they absolutely despise Donnie, you don't give this kind of interview with regard to a labelmate. You talk to that person directly (as I suggested and Willie affirmed) or you talk to your label or your manager. Likewise, it wasn't good for Donnie to respond as he did, either.

There is nothing that can be gained from giving an interview like that - there is nothing that can be gained from airing dirty laundry like that. I hope no one blames the interviewer because she just asked normal questions that they should have been able to easily answer.

The other thing that comes to mind is that you can only blame "editing" or "the blogs" or "people taking it too serious" so many times. When you say something like this, you bring unnecessary negative attention to yourself, your group, the person you are talking about, your management, your label and your fans - words are important. Hopefully, the group as a whole will quickly take ownership of and responsibility for this, as Willie has, apologize for it and move forward. I would really prefer to not have to cover these sorts of stories.

Update: On his Twitter, Willie mentioned that he and Donnie have spoken and everything is cool.


Update: Donnie has weighed in again, as well:


Part 1 of the interview:


Part 3 of the interview: