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You are here: Home / Open Threads / What Hell Hath God Wrought?

What Hell Hath God Wrought?

by John Cole|  November 30, 20134:50 am| 27 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads

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Absolutely completely 100% awake and can not sleep, so I was going through my music archives, and I found…

NICKELBACK.

How the hell did that get in there? I feel so dirty.

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27Comments

  1. 1.

    billgerat

    November 30, 2013 at 4:56 am

    You could make a cat toy out of it with some string.

  2. 2.

    Keith P.

    November 30, 2013 at 5:00 am

    I’ve got Nickelback and even Staind (worst band on the radio IMO) in my collection after getting a secondhand hard drive. I don’t believe in deleting data so I still have them in spite of never playing them. I feel dirty as well.

  3. 3.

    Triumph

    November 30, 2013 at 5:41 am

    I am judging you. SO HARD.

  4. 4.

    Splitting Image

    November 30, 2013 at 6:29 am

    Nickelback hatred is completely hipster at this point. I hated them before most Americans even knew they existed.

  5. 5.

    Comrade Nimrod Humperdink

    November 30, 2013 at 6:46 am

    It’s ok Cole, I still can’t quit Alice in Chains. I’m a grown man now, sort of, and I oughtta know better, but that sludgy guitar work and the harmonized vocals still get me every damn time.

    Hollow

  6. 6.

    Comrade Nimrod Humperdink

    November 30, 2013 at 6:49 am

    @Splitting Image: Nickelback hate has moved well past hipster and into cliche at this stage. Makes me wonder if there’s a Slate essay out there defending their artistic vision.

  7. 7.

    Betty Cracker

    November 30, 2013 at 7:42 am

    It’s probably a leftover from your wingnut days. You’re a changed man, and for the better. It would be beyond churlish to hold that against you.

  8. 8.

    lockewasright

    November 30, 2013 at 7:46 am

    I catch so much crap for being a music snob (read: for failing to be adequately indiscriminate), but this never happens to me.

  9. 9.

    OzarkHillbilly

    November 30, 2013 at 7:47 am

    What is Nickelback?

  10. 10.

    Johnnybuck

    November 30, 2013 at 7:52 am

    Do you Hootie?

  11. 11.

    NotMax

    November 30, 2013 at 7:53 am

    @OzarkHillbilly

    Thank you for that, as I have never heard the term either.

    The player on a midget football team who flicks the pigskin ?

  12. 12.

    Splitting Image

    November 30, 2013 at 8:10 am

    @Comrade Nimrod Humperdink:

    Makes me wonder if there’s a Slate essay out there defending their artistic vision.

    I know you were probably joking, but yes. The essay is actually on Businessweek, but I found it through (where else?) Slate.

    Genius: the Nickelback Story

  13. 13.

    Comrade Nimrod Humperdink

    November 30, 2013 at 8:24 am

    @Splitting Image: Amusingly, the article gushes about how much money they make with their ‘by the numbers’ approach. Doesn’t really touch the aesthetic question much. I suppose it’s nice to know he can laugh at himself, but that doesn’t make them less shitty.

  14. 14.

    Violet

    November 30, 2013 at 8:38 am

    @Splitting Image: That is hilarious. Of course that article could be found via Slate.

  15. 15.

    RepubAnon

    November 30, 2013 at 9:16 am

    Not to worry, the Nickelback detritus was probably planted by the NSA as a means of discrediting you…

    (Darn, the only tinfoil left in the house is on the leftover turkey.)

    ;)

  16. 16.

    kindness

    November 30, 2013 at 10:03 am

    Just tell anyone you were loaded when you bought it John. You had to be. You wanted to hear ‘Rockstar’.

  17. 17.

    Comrade Dread

    November 30, 2013 at 10:12 am

    I don’t get the hate myself. They’re not bad so much as just completely forgettable, which is what I usually do until someone brings them up again.

  18. 18.

    Woodrowfan

    November 30, 2013 at 10:20 am

    eh, it’s too cliche to hate them. they have a couple good songs. So does Staind. Alice in Chains had good stuff too. If you like it, listen to it

  19. 19.

    GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)

    November 30, 2013 at 10:38 am

    @Comrade Dread:
    All Nickleback songs sound the same.

    Click at your own risk.

  20. 20.

    Chickamin Slam

    November 30, 2013 at 10:48 am

    I think this should cleanse you.

    >.>
    youtube.com/watch?v=zhLoiJzKpts

    An inspired take on that old Trammps song.

  21. 21.

    RobertB

    November 30, 2013 at 11:46 am

    I’ve got Woodrowfan’s back up there. Silver Side Up is a pretty decent album. In fact, it’s so good that Nickelback made it four more times.

    If you put Alice In Chains in the same sentence as Nickelback, you should just throw your iPod away and listen to AM talk radio.

    Staind…I like a few Staind songs. Aaron Lewis is a hardcore Tea Party type. There’s an interesting subject there about, “How do you deal with music you like, from musicians that you don’t?”

  22. 22.

    Woodrowfan

    November 30, 2013 at 12:15 pm

    Aaron Lewis is a hardcore Tea Party type. There’s an interesting subject there about, “How do you deal with music you like, from musicians that you don’t?”

    ARGH!!!!!! Really? Damn. I tossed out my Ted Nugent albums. OK, small loss musically, but still.

    Well, I didn;t say AiC and NB were equally as good. ;P

  23. 23.

    cmorenc

    November 30, 2013 at 12:27 pm

    @John Cole:

    Hey, it could have been worse: you could have found some Captain and Tenille in your collection.

  24. 24.

    Keith P

    November 30, 2013 at 12:34 pm

    @RobertB: I even hatd Staind before I heard that Aaron Lewis was Tea Party. What did it for me was the time the radio played an acoustic version of “Epiphany”. It sounded like a college open mic night performance….just Lewis painfully – PAINFULLY – hitting chords on his guitar while doing what sounded like a bad Eddie Vedder parody. The DJ even apologized for playing it. Then I found out there are actually people out there with tattoos of him (ballcap included)! Makes me wonder what planet I landed on.

  25. 25.

    BruceFromOhio

    November 30, 2013 at 12:55 pm

    Gaia, wtf is with people? Cole, there are far worse things you can find on your hard drive than a Nickelback mp3 file. It’s music. Just like food, beer, wine, whiskey, movies, books, fashion, sex, modern art, automobiles and interior decorating, every one has stuff they like and stuff they do not like. So I despise the Sex Pistols and love Bowie, can’t fucking stand to here another note of Lou Reed, and will crank up Foreigner as loud as Smashing Pumpkins, so and what. Nickelback, Staind, Alice in Chains, Hootie and the Blowfish, Goo Goo Dolls, Matchbox 20, Imagine Dragons, Rush, Van Halen, Boston, find something you hate and don’t listen to it already.

    Or vice-versa.

    ETA: If it was Men Without Hats ‘Safety Dance,’ then I’d be worried.

  26. 26.

    Steve S

    November 30, 2013 at 8:01 pm

    hey john, Look at this photograph–Every time I do it makes me laugh…

    muhaahahaahaha

  27. 27.

    Hunter

    December 1, 2013 at 10:10 am

    Hating Nickelback is a cliche. Add in a dash of drama queen and you’ve got this post.

    I’ll give you the same response I gave a “music critic” at the rag I used to work for: You may not like what they do, but they do it very well.

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