What happens in God’s country stays in God’s country, it seems. In an apparent allusion to the hubbub around former Astronomer CEO Andy Byron and HR head Kristin Cabot‘s viral kiss cam moment, singer Morgan Wallen announced “Anybody in here with their side chick or whatever, I think you’re safe here,” during a concert in Glendale, Arizona, this weekend. That Morgan Wallen, he’s always had such a way with words.
Country star Wallen attracted mainstream attention in 2021 after a video in which he used a notable racial slur prompted radio stations to drop his music. Wallen, who just the year before was uninvited as a guest by Saturday Night Live for ignoring pandemic-era safety measures, apologized repeatedly for his use of the term. His supporters—either because of or despite his contrition, depending on how jaundiced your view of country fans is—responded by sending his sales through the roof.
Wallen again achieved virality this spring when he abruptly fled from the SNL stage, then posted an Instagram story depicting a private plane captioned with the plea “Get me to God’s country.” The star has never really elaborated on where “God’s country” is, but wherever it is, Wallen is clearly at its center. And like Wallen, Andy Byron has also made an abrupt exit, in his case from the company he led until late last week.
When we last left Astronomer, the company had placed Byron and Cabot on leave, saying in a statement that “The Board of Directors has initiated a formal investigation into this matter and we will have additional details to share very shortly.”
They weren’t kidding about the “shortly” part. On Saturday, Astronomer announced “Our leaders are expected to set the standard in both conduct and accountability, and recently, that standard was not met. Andy Byron has tendered his resignation, and the Board of Directors has accepted. The Board will begin a search for our next Chief Executive as Cofounder and Chief Product Officer Pete DeJoy continues to serve as interim CEO.”
It’s a speedy gear shift for Astronomer, which was riding high on a $93 million funding round this May. The company, which said that “before this week, we were known as a pioneer in the DataOps space, helping data teams power everything from modern analytics to production AI,” admits that “awareness of our company may have changed overnight.” (Perhaps in the same way that non-country fans became aware of Wallen due to one of his gaffes?)
According to the New York Post, Astronomer staffers are less than stressed by the controversy, which began when Byron and Cabot—colleagues who are both appear to be married to other people—were projected on a Jumbotron during a Coldplay concert earlier this week. When the pair, who were in a cozy clinch, realized they were on camera, they scrambled for cover, prompting singer Chris Martin to say “Whoa, look at these two. Either they’re having an affair or they’re just very shy.”
“Everybody’s laughing their ass off and enjoying the hell out of what happened and him getting exposed,” one of Byron’s former reports told the Post, claiming the former CEO was “toxic.” Us reports that former employee Zachary Hensley also made a public statement related to the controversy, writing “I’ve seen the memes (and shared more than a few), reconnected with folks I haven’t talked to in a couple of years, and felt a strange mix of pride, nostalgia and whiplash,” but that “I won’t weigh in on the recent incident or the individuals involved.” DeJoy, Us notes, gave the post a “like.”
Ry Walker, a past CEO at Astronomer, was similarly circumspect. “I’ve found Andy to be professional, I’ve only ever been on a call with him once,” Walker wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “Everyone on the team has praised his leadership to me. So I think this is an unfortunate development that comes as a big surprise.”
But while Wallen seems not to have learned from his past mistakes, following his recent “side chick” comment with a joking “I don’t condone cheating…anymore,” Coldplay’s Martin is playing it a bit safer. At a show Saturday in Madison, Wisconsin, Martin gave fair warning that the audience was about to become the show.
“We’d like to say hello to some of you in the crowd and put some of you on the big screen,” Martin spelled out from the stage. “How we’re going to do that is we’re going to use our cameras and put some of you on the big screen.”
“Please, if you haven’t done your makeup, do your makeup now,” he said. An unspoken suggestion, perhaps, that folks with something to hide might want to pull a Trap lest they become the next viral Jumbotron disaster.
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