Anselmo: I hate rock stars

Phil Anselmo has taken a pop at “ridiculous” rock stars who try to create a distance between themselves and their fans.

And he insists it’s the opposite of the correct way to go about things.

The Down frontman, who brought his Illegals band to Download this weekend, tells TeamRock Radio: “I hate rock stars, man. I hate all that untouchable ‘lay off me’ and entourages and all that shit. It’s ridiculous.

“I think the fact that we keep it down to earth, and we play songs that we damn well know are crowd favourites – I think that is a recipe for some kind of success.”

Anselmo may have a larger-than-life image, but he believes that’s not any of his own doing. “We’re not big image guys,” he states. ‘We like to let the music do the talking for us. We approach the audience as one of them, really.”

Phil Anselmo interview

Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.