Esquire recently published a not-at-all flattering online piece about The Chainsmokers, describing the EDM duo comprised of Drew Taggart and Alex Pall as “the Nickelback of EDM,” accusing the band of “blatant sexism” and “using the worst cliches the genre has to offer, and then taking it down to the river and putting it out of its misery.”
Before readers had the time to say, “Ouch!”, Pall and Taggart responded to an Esquire tweet linking to the article, offering a clever musical reply by performing hit “Paris” — mashed up with Nickelback’s “How You Remind Me”.
In the caption of the tweet, they write: “It’s not like you to say sorry so..”
Adding to the hilarity, Taggart dives into a raspy-voiced Chad Kroeger impression as he tackles the “Nickelback” hit, which just happens to have the honour of being the #1 most-played song on U.S. radio during the 2000s (according to data compiled by Nielsen Soundscan), being played more than 1.2 million times on U.S. airwaves betweem 2001 and 2009.
Days after The Chainsmokers unveiled their Nickelback homage, Nickelback multi-instrumentalist and backing vocalist Ryan Peake tweeted a video in which he performs The Chainsmokers’ “Closer”, which then segues into “How You Remind me” before merging into ‘How You Remind Me’. Writes Peake: “You may find this hard to believe, but we’ve been called way worse.”
