Avenged Sevenfold‘s M. Shadows says musicians selling multiple different pressings and versions of their albums to pad chart numbers are committing “fan abuse.” He tweeted, “Selling multiple versions, repackages and bundles of your album to the same fan so that you can get a chart position that no one cares about and is manipulated should be called out for what it is…. Fan Abuse.”
He continued, “I’ll expand: many options are fine. It’s when it becomes : buy the vinyl for ticket discounts… buy the cd version 1 for an extra track. Buy first week 8 track for an exclusive t shirt. Its all bullsh*t to make you buy the same sh*t to pump numbers. Thats f*cked!”
When asked if he was talking about someone in particular, he said, “Everyone… the system…. Music as a commodity…. No art left to it… total joke.”
After another Twitter user wrote,”Taylor Swift would've topped the charts on streams alone, (confirmed by the billboard charts) but sure go off,” Shadows replied,”Hell yeah. A truly huge artist and she deserves it.”
He later tweeted, “Btw. I wasnt even talking about Taylor… literally the furthest thing from my mind. We are getting 'options' from our label but its all a cash grab (hence the tweet)… but dont you find it strange one fan base is so upset about my tweet which names no one?”