As far as invasions of privacy go, having your personal sex tape leaked is up there. It’s difficult to imagine the kind of shock and hurt one experiences when going through such a violation, but the members of LA electronic duo Yacht could probably tell you.
In addition to being creative partners, Yacht’s core members Jona Bechtolt and Claire L. Evans are also in a romantic relationship and filmed a sex tape intended for the two of them only. However, the video has since been leaked online.
“Today, without our previous knowledge nor consent, a personal video was released,” the band wrote on Facebook. According to the duo, “due to a series of technological missteps and one morally abject person, a video that we made privately has been released to the public”.
“We have commenced legal proceedings against the aforementioned person, but now that it could potentially circulate, we feel like it’s important for you to know what happened and why,” the band continued.
“Claire and I — who have been romantic and artistic partners since 2006 — made a ‘sex tape.’ It was intended for us only. We don’t feel the need to justify the reason we made it. Anyone reading this who has been in a long term partnership understands that preserving the relationship is an ever-changing and challenging thing.”
“It’s especially difficult when the lines between career and romance are as merged as ours are. The financial pressures that we’ve been under, which de facto extend into our extracurricular lives, created a circumstance in which we felt like we needed a bit of an escape from the day-to-day.”
“So we turned on a camera, became naked, and had sex. We assumed that we were the only people who would be privy to that video. I guess we were naive. Now you have the option to be privy to that video. For us, that’s a shame.”
“We’re not as savvy as the Kardashians, but something occurred to us this morning: we could try and distribute the video directly to you ourselves. Lemonade?”The band members go on to call the leaking of the tape “a true and humiliating blurring of the public and private” and “an exploitation” as opposed to “a delicious scandal”, before announcing their decision to make the best of the situation.
“Since this happened we’ve been researching sex tapes,” the band wrote in a subsequent comment. “It shouldn’t have come as any surprise that Pamela Anderson never saw a dime from the tape she filmed with Tommy Lee, and Paris Hilton lost a court battle with the man who leaked their private video.”
“We’re not as savvy as the Kardashians, but something occurred to us this morning: we could try and distribute the video directly to you ourselves. Lemonade? This video is out there now. We can’t change that.”
“But we can try to be “as YACHT as possible” about it and take some kind of ownership over what has happened. So we’re asking you one thing: if you feel like you 100% have to see this tape, don’t stream it on some tube site, or download a torrent.”
“Instead, we beg of you to download the video, Louis C.K.-style, directly from us.” The band have since set up a special website (NSFW) where their sex tape can be purchased for $7 “if you absolutely must”.
