Steel Panther’s Michael Starr Doesn’t Give a F**k About Your Opinions About His Band

Steel Panther has gotten a lot of flack for their whole schtick throughout the years. Some of it is probably warranted and some of it probably isn’t, but frontman Michael Starr sure is fucking tired of it. Especially when it comes from other musicians. When asked if he’d try to make amends with any of those shit-talkers, he very definitely said fuck no, and honestly who could blame him?

Starr was recently interviewed by Detroit radio personality Meltdown, where he was asked if he’d ever be willing to “bury the hatchet” with some of the artists who have talked massive amounts of poo about his band. Apparently, that’s not really his thing.

“Well, I’m not in the business of burying hatchets with people that have resentment towards me, ’cause that’s on them, dude. Anybody you usually run into is not going to confront you and go, ‘Hey, man, I hate your band.’ They’ll just either ignore you or go, ‘Hey, what’s up, bro?’ So, whoever doesn’t like the band — everybody is entitled to their own opinion.”

For some context, Steel Panther got into a bit of a tiff with Mötley Cruë after Starr and Steel Panther drummer Stix Zadinia answered a fairly common question in an interview from five years ago. When asked which artist from the past they’d like to bring back, Starr said “I’d bring back Vince Neil,” to which Zadinia refuted with the fact that Neil isn’t dead. I believe this is what the kids call “standing on business,” because Starr doubled the fuck down by saying “I’d bring back Vince Neil from back in the day because that guy is dead.”

And, you guessed it—that didn’t blow over well with the Cruë. The band’s bassist Nikki Sixx then responded in a tweet saying: “The singer in Steal Panther [sic] can go fuck himself … wanna-be band putting down Vince Neil?” Ouch.

Starr has spoken before about how him and the band have developed a thicker skin over the years because of this type of criticism. Being constantly peltered by various items while playing and getting sneered at over and over will do that to ya, but at least he’s taking it in good stride.