Chimaira’s Mark Hunter on Twitter Rampage About Music Industry

For the last few days, Chimaira vocalist Mark Hunter has been sending out hundreds of tweets in a discussion/battle regarding the current state of the music industry. Hunter has been exchanging tweets with Metal Blade Records founder Brian Slagel, Lamb of God frontman Randy Blythe and his fans about Spotify, record labels and music retailers such as Best Buy and FYE.

The entertaining and eye-opening marathon discussion has been closely followed by Metal Insider, whose Zach Shaw recently conducted a lengthy interview with Hunter, covering various aspects of the music industry and its rapid evolution.

When asked about how musicians and the industry can adapt, Hunter replied, "I think it starts with the artist having to be good. And right now, what has been happening, labels will maybe get lucky with one band or they see success that another label is doing with one band. So you get a lot of copycatting and imitating ... I think there needs to be an emergence of extreme originality. And it’s so difficult to believe that I can’t hardly find a metal band anymore that doesn’t sound exactly like the metal band that was just released last week or the week before that."

After successfully getting Metal Blade's Brian Slagel to release his first public statement about Spotify, Hunter spoke highly of Slegel, stating, "Brian is one of the very few in this industry that is genuine and cares about his artists ... from the first day it’s been smiles and handshakes and “Hey, how are you doing?,” just deep respect for each other. So he’s genuine, and that’s rare."

Hunter also spoke of fans acquiring physical copies of a CD: "So if you’re a metal head and all your favorite mom and pop stores are closing down, you’re going to Best Buy because it’s cheap and you know stuff is there. Well, if our record’s not there and you want the physical product, where are you getting it? F.Y.E. for $16.99? I don’t think so!"

Check out the entire interview at Metal Insider.