Last week, the solo artist and former Black Midi member Geordie Greep's tour came to the Pearl in Vancouver. Outside the show, a man handed out flyers calling Greep a "rapist" and saying, "You know what you did this morning Oct 8th." That night, Greep took the stage an hour and 40 minutes late, without the members of his backing band, and made a statement about the allegations before playing a solo set. Soon afterward, Greep canceled the rest of his US tour dates without making a further statement. Now, his alleged victim has spoken out about his actions, as has touring keyboardist Cameron Campbell, who says that he immediately left the tour.
At the Vancouver show, Greep told the crowd that he and his bandmates had been out drinking the previous night: "It ended up in a situation where, really late at a house party, I got the wrong end of the stick with someone that was there. I made a move, and it didn't come off, and I really quickly, of course, apologized. It was a complete misunderstanding on my part, and I felt extremely bad." He went on to insist that he is "not a rapist." Greep's alleged victim agrees with that part, but she says that she passed out while drunk and woke up to Greep kissing her on the lips without consent.
Paste has published a long report from both Greep's anonymous victim, who goes by the pseudonym "Laura" in the article, and from Cameron Campbell. (Reps for Greep declined to comment when Paste presented them with the story. Stereogum has also reached out for comment, and we'll update if we hear back.) Laura tells Paste, "I was not raped. I was sexually assaulted, and [it was] more than a kiss taken the wrong way." She also says that a male acquaintance distributed the flyers calling Greep a rapist without her consent: "A man who was mad made the false claim, not the victim. I want that to be very clear."
Laura tells Paste that she and a friend met Greep and Campbell at a bar and that she repeatedly mentioned that she's in an exclusive relationship. After the bar closed, the group went to Laura's friend's apartment. During the walk, Laura says that Greep "made inappropriate comments about homeless people," and Campbell adds that he also said off-putting things about "his opinion on race or gender or things like that," agreeing that Greep's words made the group uncomfortable. Laura says that she passed out around 5 a.m. and woke up to Greep kissing her: "I don’t know for how long because I was passed out, but I think I woke up fairly quickly. His lips were on my lips, trying to make out with me, and then I pushed him off."
In the story told by both Laura and Campbell, Laura's friends and Campbell rushed in when they heard her screaming at Greep. Allegedly, Laura's friends kicked Greep out of the house, but Greep kept trying to return, at one point claiming that he was "looking for his phone." Campbell says, "He tried to start downplaying it right there, saying that he only tried to give her a kiss on the cheek — which, again, if she’s asleep, that doesn’t really make it OK either way." He adds that he saw Laura "crying and very visibly shaken up" in the aftermath.
Campbell says that he immediately decided to quit Greep's band and made plans to return home. He says he told Greep's tour manager about it, and Greep's tour manager told the rest of the band: "We all confronted Geordie about the situation and told him that his behavior is completely unacceptable." He says that he didn't hear about the accusatory flyers until he was in an Uber, on his way to the airport.
Paste, whose contributing news editor Tatiana Tenreyro did exemplary work on this story, has longer statements from both Laura and Campbell. You can read the full story here.
If you or someone you know has undergone sexual abuse, please visit rainn.org or contact the National Sexual Assault Helpline at 1-800-656-4673.