Texas-born country singer Charley Crockett — a Rio Grande Valley native who claims descendancy from Davy Crockett — is apt to speak his mind on social media. In his latest post, he took issue with a San Antonio news outlet reporting on his stance on data centers, calling the article “a riot.”
Toward the finale of a lengthy post that began as a musing on Bob Dylan and ended up reflecting on the corporate co-opting of outlaw country to “repackage Waylon and Willie,” Crockett said, “It’s difficult for me to take a celebrity serious railing against data centers when they’re posting enough selfie videos to house one themselves.” Social media companies like Meta rely on the data centers they own and operate for functions like storing users’ posts and running the algorithm that creates your feed.
That drive-by mention of data centers was all he had to say on the subject, as the rest of the July 27 post praises Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash for pushing the boundaries in the music business, even when “it would have been more profitable if they played it safe.”
The San Antonio Current saw newsworthiness when Willie Nelson came out swinging against data centers the day after Crockett’s post, urging Texans to fight against those “loud, water thieving, light polluting” structures that are “invading our land” and his hometown of Abbott.
The difference between the two country stars’ statements led the Current to report on August 3 that “Crockett’s remarks stand in contrast to legends Tanya Tucker and Willie Nelson, who recently spoke out against data centers’ threat to rural Texas.” The article nods toward the mystery of just who Crockett was talking about in his post, but said that as of the day of his statement, “Brad Paisley had already come out against a data center threatening the Nashville Zoo in a selfie video. (Hmm).”
In an August 4 follow-up, he wrote, “Wow. So now a newspaper in San Antonio is presenting me as pro data center. What a riot.” He also clarified his position, saying “I’m against data centers. I don’t like AI” but acknowledging that many (including himself) are complicit in society’s tech dependency. He didn’t call out the paper or the writer by name, but it seemed to be aimed at the Current.
The article does not call Crockett pro-data center but does point out an “interesting coincidence of timing.” San Antonio Current Editor-in-Chief Sanford Nowlin stood by the outlet’s reporting, telling MySA, “The newsworthy thing that our writer was addressing is that his post came out roughly the same time as a couple of country music icons had opined on data centers. That’s what was being addressed, and at no point did we accuse him of being pro [data center]. Just pointing out that he seemed to be interested in railing against his perceived hypocrisy of other stars having opinions about data centers.”
Nowlin said, “I know he’s someone who’s prone to share opinions on social media. But I was a little surprised that the article warranted as much.” He continued, adding that “we’re just going to let our story speak for itself. You can look at it and see what was actually said in the story.”