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I know we had a thread about this a while back, but why all the hate on Nickelback? They seem perfectly fine to me. I like some of their songs, actually. Can anyone elaborate on this? I really would like a well documented answer.

I don't. They're not my favorite band and also not a great band by my standards. By I wouldn't call them bad, just mediocre at most. They have some good songs, but that's where it stops.

Most of the Nickelback hate is the same as Justin Bieber and 9gag hate, bandwagon hate. They don't know why they should hate them, but everyone does it, so hating most likely makes you cool on the internet.

The core reason is because of how generic, yet popular they are. They're music is simple and for the most part replicable by garage band kids.

But that doesn't me that they're bad. I think they're okay, they're just nothing special.

All Nickelback songs sound the SAME …

Most of the Nickelback hate is the same as Justin Bieber and 9gag hate, bandwagon hate. They don’t know why they should hate them, but everyone does it, so hating most likely makes you cool on the internet.

Bingo. It's all part of two phenomena in human culture.

1: Any mediocre thing that gets over-celebrated will warrant a backlash of anti-celebration to counteract the popularity.

2. Sheep think. People like to hate things because others do it. They compound how much they dislike something based on how many peers around them do it too.

This has been observed and discussed many times here (Especially on the Nickelback Article comments but I'd rather have that discussion here anyway). I believe the Meme Elitism thread touched on the phenomena slightly as well.

Justin Beiber, Rebecca Black, Lady Gaga, One direction…all of them recieved their hate for exactly the same reason: They are mediocre. Not everyone is interested. And those that are not interested feel the need to react with an equal amount of disgust compared to those who are interested and reacting with jubilee

It takes a bit of maturity to learn that what sounds rotten to you, may sound awesome towards others (music being as subjective as it is) so it's rather fruitless and hypocritical to attack a band or its fans based on how their music sounds to you alone. But alas not everyone is so mature and that's why Nickelhate is a meme

You will never see me hate on Nickleback despite the fact that their music is boring to me. I understand that their music sounds genuinely good to others and therefore it can't be the worst thing ever, nor is it my place to dictate otherwise. I expect people to treat my own music tastes with respect and not tell me to stop listening to BSE just because they don't have guitar solo's therefore it would be hypocritical of me to tell people they need to stop listening to Nickelback just because they don't have bass drops

I don't think they're the worst there is, but I've listen to about ten or so of their songs. They all sound the same. The number one turn-off for me in music is when I don't like the vocals. If I don't like the singing, it's just unlistenable to me. I really don't like Chad Kroeger's voice at all and the guitar work just seems like soulless, repeating power chords.

But they're definitely not the worst. I could name about twenty worse bands from the 1960s up until now that are arguably worse than Nickelback.

Like RandomMan said, it's usually just bandwagon hate.

I actually like some of their songs. I have 3 songs of theirs on my media player. They include "Rockstar", "Gotta Be Somebody", and "Feelin' Way Too Damn Good". I also like "Lullaby", but for some reason the album version doesn't sound as good as it does on the radio.

I like them, they used to be one of my favorite bands. I still really like "Rock Star".

Many people "hate" Nickelback to look cool.

However, I do have a few legitimate reasons behind the hate to the band
*Nickelback sticks to one formula most of the time. Their hits How You Remind Me, Someday, and Savin' Me seemed to follow the same style…other songs like Photograph, Far Away, If Everyone Cared, and If Today Was Your Last Day also feels the same. The band rarely tries other things differently, and that caused people who already hate one of their songs to hate them all

*Downfall of lyricism. Early Nickelback albums were decent (not excellent) in lyrics…but on their 4th album The Long Road, they released a hard rock single "Figured You Out" which was more sexually explicit. Suddenly by the time we hit Dark Horse, there's a huge ton of sexual/partying songs. Most bands I know tend to mature in lyricism, away from sex/partying as time goes on, but Nickelback went in reverse.

*The bands that followed. There's been a ton of other bands that became popular thanks to Nickelback, the biggest names include Theory of a Deadman (also from Canada and discovered by Chad Kroger himself), Saving Abel, and Hinder. A few others like Puddle of Mudd, Three Days Grace (also from Canada but is more lenient towards hard rock/alt metal) and Seether also jumped aboard, contributing to an already oversaturated genre. And the songs they released followed the same trend as Nickelback, leading to more backlash. Theory of a Deadman managed to literally come out even more mysogomist than Nickelback on their sex/partying songs and Hinder combined the worst of hair metal and post-grunge into one package.

*The Dark Horse album. This album was apparently created in pro tools and FL Studio with no instruments…and this is a rock album with no electronic influences. There is no need to create a rock album on the computer without guitars or drums. The Foo Fighters recently created their latest album Wasting Light in a garage with no electronics or mixing (in other words, the old fashioned way…play the whole song live in a garage, and take the best run for the album).

*Finally, radio overplay. And this is also the reason why people end up hating a lot of songs and bands. A lot of songs I ended up having issues with were because they got overplayed, and many rock stations kept playing Nickelback again and again (top 40/adult contemporary formats also did the same thing with their poppy songs). People get sick of them really quickly. Internet radio has not been friendly as well, often relying on playing their singles more often than their lesser known album cuts.

The fun part is, Chad Kroger doesn't care about his haters. In fact, he knows there are people that hate his music. He takes the criticism, and keeps on playing music with Nickelback (well…except that one video that we all know by now where Chad gets hit by a rock).

What I dislike about them is how their songs generally never leave much of an impression on me at all while most of the other artists' songs you hear on the radio constantly are at least really catchy.

Gotta be somebody really gives me the feels and I've never heard a Nickleback song that's lyrics flowed together so nicely, but that's really all I can say.

when I hear a song and it makes me cringe,
it's not about the artist(s),
it's not about what station it's played on,
it's not about what medium I'm hearing this song from,
it's that it's a bad song, poorly written, poor lyrics, annoying instrumentals, annoying voice

and just so happens that most nickelback songs make me cringe,

I shouldn't even have to think for a minute and be like "wel….why is this song making me cringe? maybe I should be more logical about judging this song"

no, I think from the gut, and my gut is always right

I am not a fan of Nickelback. I do not, nor have I ever really, listened to their music. But I'm not a hater either. Usually, I have no reason to even bring up Nickelback on the Internet, let alone bash them. I'm a neutral, because I haven't listened to them and haven't judged whether or not I like them.

However, if somebody genuinely dislikes their music, no problem. But if it's just bandwagon hate (like with David Guetta), then I get annoyed.

I dislike Nickelback for a number of reasons.
-Usually bland or repetitive instrumentally.
-Meaningless lyrics.
-Radio overplay.

Just like I said in the J.B. thread, one of the reasons I don't like mainstream artists is because they are being put in the spotlight more than more deserving, more talented bands and artists.

I kind of like Nickelback, especially "How You Remind Me." I find some of the hate comments to be hilarious really. It seems like most people are jokingly hating rather than absolutely disgusted.

I dislike so many things, so Nickelback, I don't care very much.

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure. I've only ever heard one of their songs (Rock Star), and I guess it's alright. I'm not a huge fan of the lyrics, but it's kinda catchy nonetheless.

Ahh, I see.

It's just force hating. Although the physiological aspect I understand, I'm surprised no-one has stood up to saying they don't mind listing to Nickelback every now and then.

Well, thank-you for all of your answers, it really brings up the light on this subject.

Requesting lock, since this thread doesn't really need anymore posts.

ya its just bandwagon hate i ask people why they hate Nickelback most if the time they say there songs suck and they never say why but there not may Favorite band

The only nickelback song I like is Hero from the first Spider-man movie.

Locking upon OP's request. Thanks for the input, e'rybody.