The country band Son’s of Maxwell wrote a song in 2009 based on the personal experience of their guitarist Dave Carroll. The song was not inspired by something sad, romantic, or exciting but of an accident based on the unfortunate episode of having your luggage destroyed by an organization with a lot of money. That organization was United Airlines. The airline workers destroyed his guitar when they were loading it into the luggage carrier on a plane ride from Halifax to Nebraska. According to their web site davecarrollmusic.com, the bass player saw the damage happening, told Carroll and he asked the flight attendants to look at the matter. They blew him off. While this is not particularly new for frequent flyers who have reported losing luggage and belongings by taking a flight, Carroll did not take the loss lightly. He wrote a song about the irresponsibility and callousness of United Airlines and their handling of luggage and posted it on Youtube. It became popular and United Airlines encountered a public relations nightmare.
According to David Carroll’s blog, he had tried for months to get some form of compensation for the loss of his $3,500 guitar. He wrote, “They didn't deny the experience occurred, but for nine months the various people I communicated with put the responsibility for dealing with the damage on everyone other than themselves and finally said they would do nothing to compensate me for my loss.”
The Vancouver Sun reported that Sons of Maxwell demanded United Airlines give an apology and compensation for the damage done to the guitar but they refused. The Sun also reported that Carroll did give United Airlines a fair warning that they would write a song about the destruction of their guitar and the treatment they were given after the incident but United did not respond. Carroll explained the situation on the show The View saying, “I told the last customer service rep that I would do this and that…I urged her to reconsider because if…they came to give compensation after the first video was out then I wasn’t going to take it.”
This is great. You did a good job at telling Carrolls story in a clear and concise way. I can also tell that you did a lot of research outside of simply watching the music video. I especally liked the facts you chose to include and your use of quotes.
ReplyDeleteI like how you brought in all the news sources that United Breaks Guitars received. My favorite part of the post however, was the comment that Carroll made regarding the plans for the third song despite United's efforts to compensate for the damages. Well done!
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