For roughly two decades now, Nickelback have been a punchline in metal circles — the obligatory scapegoats for everything "wrong" with today's popular rock music. However, the Canadian superstars just earned some serious cred by one of heavy-music's most respected figures. Devin Townsend — the prolific prog-metal wiz of Strapping Young Lad fame — recently said that Nickelback frontman Chad Kroeger is "so much more of a metalhead than I am."
In a new interview with Ultimate Guitar, Townsend was speaking about his collaboration with Kroeger on the former's 2019 album, Empath, which features vocals from Kroeger on the song "Hear Me." Townsend couldn't say enough great things about the "Rockstar" singer, gushing about how brilliant he is as an individual, and yes, revealing that he's truly a big-time metalhead.
"Chad's brilliant," Townsend said. "Chad is a phenomenally intelligent human being. But he's a rockstar, too, on levels that you and I will never participate in. And so there's gonna be a disconnect just based on that. You only have a few things in common, and then, after a while you run out of things to talk about.
"I think it was flattering for me at first, too. But again, guy's got a very complex life, and I can't understand a lot of it. How could I? It's not within the realm of my world. But I think he's exceptionally talented. I think he's phenomenally intelligent."
Later in the interview, Townsend explained that while he's publicly known as this crazy, off-the-wall metal guy, he's actually way more reserved and chill in his private life — whereas Kroeger is a headbanging lifer who blares heavy music at all hours of the night.
"Even if I respect and care for people, after a certain amount of time, again, I have to tap out," Townsend said. "I'm like, 'Dude, I can't hang with this.' I'm in bed by nine, usually. I don't want to listen to Pantera at four in the morning, you know?
"And that's not a character flaw at all, it's just a different frequency that folks like that exist on. I'm not like that. But sometimes it takes experiences with folks like that to know that. Maybe you think you can hang, and then you get there.
"And I mean, with Chad, I remember being at his house a couple times, and just being, 'Wow, this is so intense, man.' He had a stage set up, and it's metal all night. And I'm thinking like, 'Man, you are so much more of a metalhead than I am.' But I do care for him. And I think he's brilliant."
