How Did Nickelback Become the Whipping Boys of Rock?
I’ve never understood the amount of hate and ridicule foisted upon Nickelback. Sure, they may not be to everyone’s taste, but isn’t the amount of animus directed toward them irrationally disproportionate? Surely there are worse bands out there (cf. Creed, Brokencyde, Limp Bizkit).
When news that a PEI police detachment was prepared to audio waterboard drunk drivers by playing them Nickelback’s Silver Side Up album, the bashing escalated once again. I was on CJOB in Winnipeg trying to explain the phenomenon. And then today The Guardian tries to get to the bottom of the issue.
‘We will catch you. On top of a hefty fine, a criminal charge and a year’s driving suspension, we will also provide you with a bonus gift of playing the office’s copy of Nickelback in the cruiser on the way to jail.” This is how cops in far-flung Kensington, on Prince Edward Island, Canada, are disincentivising drunk drivers this Christmas – by threatening them with a blast of Chad Kroeger’s band’s 2001 drive-schlock classic album Silver Side Up,according to their Facebook page.
They’re not even the first police force to engage in these Chadist hate crimes. From the photograph meme (in which strange pictures are Photoshopped into a frame held by Kroeger in that song’s video) to parody songs, bashing the ’Back has long since become a sport. Not that the band have always taken it lying down. When Brighton rock duo Royal Blood tweeted a Nickelback gag in October, the Canadians hit back with: “Nickelback jokes are like @royalblooduk, they were a lot cooler a couple years ago.”
You can read the rest of the article, but the headline is misleading. No definitive answer is provided.
Anyone want to weigh in with a serious answer? And it’s not good enough to say that they suck.
