Back on Sunday, Ears To The House reported on the fallout from the now-deleted PBS documentary starring Derrick May. Within hours of the programme being broadcast on the network last Wednesday, PBS took it down from their streaming service – after receiving numerous complaints about it.
To say the least, it hasn’t gone well for him. The city’s sympathy is largely with Drummer B – whose moment to shine on national TV was taken off him by his own supposed friend. And the other members of the so-called Belleville Three are apparently worried this reduces the odds of their tour next year from taking place.
But it turns out that in the process, May has irritated yet another group of people – the chief execs at PBS themselves. According to a Facebook post by the ever mischievous Michael James last night, this show was part of a series – and there are at least three more episodes of the show that have yet to be broadcast.
Furthermore, at least one more episode – which was originally due to be broadcast on November 22, just under two weeks from now – was curated by none other than Derrick May himself. This particular episode features Kevin Reynolds – a producer in his own right and a former employee at May’s own Transmat Records.
The result of all this? It means executives at the channel have to make a decision on what to do with the remaining Derrick May curated episode of the show. That, and the fact that Reynolds’s own appearance is now likely to end up in the same digital purgatory that Drummer B’s performance now lies in.
At the time of writing this article, last night’s episode of Detroit Performs was scheduled to air when we looked on Detroit Public TV’s listings. The listings for November 22 aren’t yet available, but even if it does appear, this isn’t necessarily a guarantee that the show will ultimately air.
Ears To The House has contacted PBS to see if they can shed any more light on how they’ll deal with this dilemma. It really does seem that “everything [Derrick May] touches turns to s**t right now.”…
