Say what you will about Nickelback’s music, but the Canadian rockers seem to be genuinely good guys who are at least partially in on the joke.
Frontman Chad Kroeger once said that “anybody that thinks that we take this band seriously is hilarious,” and that is about as solid an approach to critics and online vitriol as it gets.
A few years ago, Mike Kroeger inadvertently started a rumor about a potential album of Slayer covers. When asked by Wall Of Sound if Nickelback would do a heavy record, the bass player said, “I would love to. Metal is what makes me go; it’s what I listen to without fail. If we could actually sink in and do a metal album, all four of us would love it.”
Describing Nickelback as “metalheads at our core,” Kroeger continued: “We all know everything about the Big Four – Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax and Slayer.”
“I would do a Slayer cover album if I could,” he noted. “That’s where my heart lies. There are just never enough hours in the day to do everything, but let’s just say I wouldn’t count it out.”
Of course, the internet did what the internet does and twisted Kroeger’s words to mean that a Slayer covers record was in the works, to which he clarified in an interview with the New Hampshire Union Leader: “I’m a metal head, love metal music, love Slayer in particular; they’re one of my favorites. And I would love to play that music, but I couldn’t speak for Nickelback in saying that we want to do a Slayer cover band or make a death-metal record.”
Even though a Nickelback album of proper Slayer covers is doubtful, guitarist Ryan Peake is more than happy to take the band’s trolling of gatekeeping jerks one step further.
Asked by Rock Sverige about the Slayer rumor, Peake said: “I don’t know if it would be something we all could agree on because we are all have our different likes and dislikes when it comes to music. Mike’s is really heavy and I like Slayer so I get that. I think we could probably agree on doing a heavy covers album or something like that.”
Peake then throws the gauntlet, saying: “Maybe do a Testament, Slayer, Meshuggah album? I don’t know.”
Even though this will never happen, the fact that Nickelback can at least joke about Meshuggah makes me like them a bit more (as people, of course; not musicians).