Short Stack
If there’s one Aussie band that typifies the ‘love/hate’ tug-of-war, it’s Short Stack. Busting out of Budgewoi (on the NSW Central Coast) in 2008, the lads boast a legion of die-hard fans who love them so much they’ve broken the ‘like’ button on Facebook. On the other side of the fence is an equally vocal group who loathe their over-styled haircuts and post-emo posing with a vengeance, claiming they’re just a major label machine aimed squarely at tweens’ angst and wallets.
In 2009, the fans won out when the band’s debut Stack Is The New Black topped the ARIA charts. In 2010, the band followed it up with a more mature, musically elaborate sequel This Is Bat Country and the hostilities seemed to be fading until this happened (bassist Andy Clemmensen got busted stealing other people’s reviews).
When Channel [V] reported it on their show The Riff, fans sent them death threats, a rather nasty occurrence which happened again in 2011 when rapper 360 and the band got involved in a social media slanging match over the station’s Oz Artist of the Year award (see 360 talking about it here). Well, fan is short for fanatic after all!