When Kelcy Warren of Energy Transfer Partners is not building pipelines, he runs a small record label that puts out folk music. In December 2013, Warren’s record label, Music Road Records, released the album “Looking into You: A Tribute to Jackson Browne.” It was a passion project spearheaded by Warren himself, a longtime fan of Browne’s. In a press release for the album, Warren is quoted as saying, “I don’t know of anybody that admires Jackson more than me.” Jackson Browne is now one of 13 artists who signed on to a letter to Warren vowing to no longer play in Warren’s Cherokee Creek Music Festival or participate in Music Road Records recordings. In a statement released to Indian Country Today Media Network, Browne also pledged to donate the money he’s received and will receive from the album to tribes opposing the pipeline. Browne writes: “I did not know anything about Kelcy Warren’s other business as the production of this album went forward. Although as a music publisher there is no legal way to deny permission to a record company to cover a song that has been previously published, I could have dissuaded the artists from appearing on this record had I known.” Browne goes on to say, “I do not play for oil interests. I do not play for companies who defile nature, or companies who attack demonstrators with trained attack dogs and pepper spray. I certainly would not have allowed my songs to be recorded by a record company whose owner’s other business does what Energy Transfer Partners is allegedly doing—threatening the water supply and the sacred sites of indigenous people.”
