STIX ZADINIA On Why STEEL PANTHER Hasn't Been Affected By 'Cancel Culture': 'We Built This Band On Being Irreverent'

In a new interview with the "Everblack" podcast, drummer Stix Zadinia of California glam metal jokesters STEEL PANTHER — whose songs contain what some critics say are racist, misogynistic and lewd lyrics — was asked if he and his bandmates have been affected by "cancel culture", a term which describes efforts to shun, silence or demonetize people who express unpopular beliefs. He responded (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "That's a good question. And, actually, we get that question quite a lot now, or we have over the past couple of years. But no, we haven't had anybody come to us and go, 'Oh, guys, you can't do that.' And I think one of the main reasons for that is we're our own record company, we run everything, we are the merch company — we are truly 'do it yourself.'

"I think that we built this band on being irreverent, we built it on not giving a fuck, and people who are fans of our band generally, they celebrate that fact," he explained. "So I feel like there's a very conscious choice on our part to not follow the trend and not try to go be politically correct, 'cause that's the antithesis of our band. That wouldn't be organic and it wouldn't be natural for us. And the minute we start to do that, everybody who likes us for what we stand for and what we represent, which is freedom to say whatever the fuck you want, not hurt anybody, but just go be a freak, and the minute we do that, then the people who like us for that, they'd be bummed. They'd be, like, 'Oh, that's not my band anymore.' And we are forever grateful for people who are on the STEEL PANTHER bus. And to change the bus just because there's some people out there going, 'Oh, you can't say that. You're gonna hurt people's feelings' — fuck off. Don't listen."

Stix's bandmate, STEEL PANTHER singer Michael Starr, previously talked about cancel culture in a March 2023 interview with Canada's The Metal Voice. Asked if he and his bandmates had been affected by efforts to silence differing opinions and voices, he responded: "No, not really. I mean, I don't wanna say 'not really.' I would just say… I mean, the only pushback we got was for a plug-in that [STEEL PANTHER guitarist] Satchel designed called the 'Pussy Melter'. And it was on the TC Electronic web site and a girl guitar player saw it and she got extremely offended by it. And she wrote the company and they took the plug-in off because one person was upset with it. And so Satchel came up with the idea, and he said, 'Why don't we just make a fucking guitar pedal?' So we got into the guitar pedal business. Man, that thing flew off the shelves so quick. 'Cause people were trying to cancel us. We only made, like, I think, ten thousand of 'em or something — just a small order of 'em. Because it's expensive to get that capital to make 'em all. So we made, like, ten thousand and we made it a limited edition and it cut off at a certain number. And we sold 'em all in, like, two weeks. And so that [was a situation where] somebody tried to cancel us — like a subcategory of us — and it kind of backfired on them."

Starr went on to say that people who attend STEEL PANTHER concerts are fully aware of what they are going to see at the performances, including girls being invited girls up on stage to flash their breasts and single-entendre lyrics that seemingly objectify women and demean everybody.

"People that come to our shows, they know what to expect," Michael explained. "No one walks off the street and just goes, 'Oh, that looks like a fun show. I'm gonna go in.' And they buy a ticket and go in and go, 'Oh my God! I am so offended by them saying 'fuck',' or whatever. 'They said 'Asian hooker'. That's so racist.' People that come know what they're coming into. They know they're coming to a show where they're gonna laugh and hear some profane, politically incorrect humor. And if it's their first time [seeing the band], it's because their friend brought 'em. And people are pretty aware of what's going on. So I think everyone is there for the same party. So we really, really haven't experienced any of that [cancel culture]."

Starr added: "Our shows have been selling out on this tour. And I like to attribute it to how great my hair looks. But it's not that. It's more like people are sick of not being heard. And people are sick of fucking getting bullshitted and they want something that they can count on.

"You go to a sports game and, for the most part, you can count on it being an even match. The refs may fuck up a couple of calls. At the end of the day, at the end, somebody wins and somebody loses. There's truth to that. And when you come see us, at the end of the day, you're gonna get drunk, you're gonna laugh and you're gonna have a good time. You can't argue with that. And I think people really wanna just do that."

Three years ago, Satchel lamented the current stage of the world when asked about the future of comedy and entertainment during an appearance on the "2020'd" podcast. At the time, he said: "I know that wokeism is out of control and cancel culture is out of control right now, but people love to laugh and people love to be able to speak their fucking mind. And you can't be funny, I think, if you can't push the envelope a little bit and joke about shit that you're not supposed to joke about. And that's one of the things that is great about the differences in people — being able to joke about cultural differences. Because there's huge differences between black and white culture, there's huge differences between Asian culture and black culture, or gay culture and heterosexual culture. Gay guys are fucking hilarious; they're really funny. And I don't understand a lot of it, but they're funny as fuck. I'm not gay, so I don't suck dicks, but, to me, the whole idea of being gay is very funny, and there’s a lot of funny shit in that.

"Listen, stereotypes are stereotypes because they are fucking funny," he explained. "It's funny to joke about Asian people being bad drivers, 'cause there's a lot of 'em."

Satchel went on to say that STEEL PANTHER concerts provide a safe space for people to make fun of all situations and individuals equally without fear of offending someone.

"One of the things that I love about being in STEEL PANTHER, and one of the things I love about our shows, is that people who go to our show, and it doesn't matter whether they're white or black, or male or female, or gay or hetero, they go to our show because they love that they're in a place where everybody's… The playing field is level, because we make fun of everybody, and everybody can laugh at everything, and you don't have to worry about it," he said. "And you don't have to watch what you say because everybody can joke about everything. Everybody's in on it, so everybody has fun. And it really lets everybody let their guard down and everybody can have fucking fun.

"When you're out in public normally, most people are very aware of what they can and can't say in this day and age," he added. "And God, that gets fucking old after a while. Most people are just, like, 'Fuck, I just wanna cuss and make fun of a gay person for once. Come on.'"

STEEL PANTHER's sixth studio album, "On The Prowl", was released in February 2023.

In September 2022, STEEL PANTHER announced the addition of Spyder as the band's new bassist.

The group's music has been described as "VAN HALEN meets MÖTLEY CRÜE meets RATT meets 'Wayne's World', complete with operatic shrieks, misogyny, shredding guitar solos and libidinal overdrive."

Sixteen years ago, STEEL PANTHER changed its name from METAL SKOOL to its current moniker and shifted the focus of its act from '80s metal covers to originals.

Photo credit: David Jackson