NICKELBACK TO CONTINUE FUNDING ROADRUNNER BANDS WE ACTUALLY LIKE FOR ABOUT FIVE MORE YEARS; AFTER THAT, ALL BETS ARE OFF [AKA THE LIVE NATION DEAL]

News of Nickelback’s all-encompassing deal with touring behemoths Live Nation is all over the Internet. “Fuck Nickelback,” I hear you say. Touche. But let’s read between the lines here: Nickelback, quite honestly, are a large part of the reason that Roadrunner Records is able to continue to release records by other, less-sucky acts. Simply put, Nickelback’s 7 million records sold fund every 100,000 to 200,000-selling release by other Roadrunner bands we like, such as Killswitch Engage, Machine Head, Opeth, Megadeth, Dream Theater, Biffy Clyro, Life of Agony, Trivium, Soufly, etc etc etc etc. Get it?

The fact of the matter is, Nickelback leaving Roadrunner is actually BAD news for the metal community, as hard as this is to believe. Love them or hate them, Roadrunner definitely sits atop the metal label throne, and what’s bad for Roadrunner is bad for metal. And this is most certainly bad for Roadrunner.

The good news is that Roadrunner still has Nickelback under contract for two more records, so we can reasonably expect these two albums and subsequent touring cycles to last approximately five years. Sweet. Wait, what the fuck… did I really just say that?

-VN

[Source: Billboard.com]