Chris Barnes Did NOT Say ‘Every Death Metal Singer Sucks Except Me’
UPDATE: It was erroneously reported that Six Feet Under's Chris Barnes stated that every death metal singer sucks except for him. The quoted Facebook post appeared in multiple media reports and, per Barnes, this statement was made from an "imposter" account and did not originate from him, nor did he make the claim at any point.
Chris Barnes, frontman for Six Feet Under and formerly of Cannibal Corpse, has been throwing shade at the death metal scene over the last week. He took aim at a 'Death Metal Round Table' interview feature with the vocalists of Cannibal Corpse, The Black Dahlia Murder, Gatecreeper and Undeath and later said, "Every death metal vocalist sucks except me."
The round table interview, hosted by Knotfest, was published on Jan. 19 where George 'Corpsegrinder' Fisher, Trevor Strnad, Chas Mason and Alex Jones discussed a range of topics, from their early discovery of the genre, accessibility and gateway bands, and more. The range of artists also helped cover perspectives from metal's heyday, the rise of the internet through the current day.
Barnes, who split with Cannibal Corpse in 1995 and has steadily put out new material with Six Feet under ever since, evidently did not enjoy that chat and tweeted, "I just watched a 'death metal' podcast on YouTube that was done about a week ago with the 'top' death metal vocalists .. it made my physically ill. I despise what this genre has become."
Hatebreed frontman and The Jasta Show podcast host Jamey Jasta commented and invited Barnes to guest on the podcast to further discuss how he felt. "No thanks brother," wrote Barnes, who once dedicated a song to Hatebreed from the stage on Six Feet Under's 2004 live record, Live With Full Force. "I have no need to jump on that bandwagon[,] you guys [have] got that," he added.
The exchange continued with Jasta calling the reply "weak," to which Barnes said, "Ain't here to play games. You have fun tho [sic] bro."
"You're the one playing games," the Hatebreed vocalist, who recently worked with Corpsegrinder on his forthcoming solo debut album, fired back and then asked, "You 'hate what the genre has become' but do you ever promote or discuss new bands or try and help building [sic] anything in the genre?"
Barnes laughed off the idea of promoting other bands and Jasta needled, "Oh right that's beneath you," and Barnes capped off the back and forth with, "Nah I'm just not a shill."
Barnes never elaborated on what exactly it is about the podcast him so badly or what he detests about death metal today, but later that day (on Facebook) he asserted, "Every death metal singer sucks except me."
It is unclear whether or not this is a sarcastic comment from the vocalist (whose band does not have comments enabled on YouTube for any single released off of their last two albums), or if it was one made in sincerity.
Something else caught Barnes' eye on Twitter a couple days later which prompted him to mock the ticket price of an upcoming Cannibal Corpse show in Sacramento, California with Whitechapel, Revocation and Shadow of Intent.
One Twitter user asked, "How the fuck is it $105 per ticket...?" for the show and captioned the text-overlayed image with, "Damn didn't know Metallica was playing," to further mock the exorbitant price tag.
"Yikes! Price gouging much," the Six Feet Under singer replied with emojis depicting crying with laughter added on.
It should be noted that ticket prices for the tour are varied, but are also available as low as $27.50 for some shows, indicating that over $100 is not the standard price per ticket for the entirety of the run. The $105 ticket for the show in Sacramento is also listed as a verified resale ticket, meaning the secondary market is behind the high price.
See a full list of Cannibal Corpse's upcoming tour dates here.