Waterparks Apologize For Featuring Danny Elfman On New Album

Back in 2023, the composer Nomi Abadi sued veteran film scorer Danny Elfman for failing to pay several installments in a sexual harassment settlement. A few months later, a Jane Doe also accused Elfman of sexual misconduct. Elfman denied Abadi's allegations in a statement to Rolling Stone, leading her to sue him again for defamation in 2024; that's ongoing after a Superior Court judge rejected Elfman's anti-SLAPP motion. The Jane Doe's case was dismissed on technical grounds, and Elfman has also sued her for malicious prosecution.

Despite all that very damning public information, Elfman's career has shown no signs of slowing down: He's billed right before the headliner at this weekend's Sick New World festival in Las Vegas, and had tons of involvement in A$AP Rocky's new Don't Be Dumb album rollout, on which he also performs. More recently, Elfman contributed to the opening track of pop-punk band Waterparks' upcoming album Jinx, a move that's left some fans disappointed.

Waterparks are no strangers to controversy in their own right: On numerous occasions, people online have dug up racist and edgelord-y comments made by frontman Awsten Knight throughout the 2010s. Beyond that, Knight shared a couple of weeks ago that the band's Los Angeles storage unit/studio were targeted in an armed robbery while they were on tour abroad. He said there was a police helicopter chase of the four men, who are now all in prison and claim they were hired by someone (Knight also claims he has some ideas of who those men might be). Occasionally, Waterparks lean into the drama: Knight once famously spread rumors that their drummer Otto Wood — who doesn't have social media and shares his name with an early 20th century career criminal — was a serial killer. (Knight cleared the air on that last year.) Even their X bio reads: “THE DRAMA OF WATERPARKS, ARE THEY GOING TO LOSE EVERYTHING?”

So after Waterparks revealed the Elfman-featuring Jinx tracklist last week, the band issued a statement yesterday saying they were unaware of the allegations about the musician. It reads:

I found out the same way y'all did a couple days after announcing the album. It's my fault for not digging deeper than I did beforehand and I take responsibility for that. Although this may not suffice for everyone, which I do understand, it really is the most that I'm able to say. I'm truly beyond sorry for everything and I promise we're doing our best to learn and grow, and we'll be better because of it moving forward.

It looks like Elfman will still be featuring on the album's opening track "Tell Me Why," where he's voicing "the devil." Blink-182's Mark Hoppus, Fozy Shazam's Eric Nally, and the DJ Dillon Francis also feature on the track.