The evil genius of Nickelback.

I actually like them because I think they're hi-larious. The angst! The pain! The thing where "How You Remind Me" and "Someday " are musically pretty much the same song with different lyrics! Seriously, the lulz are great. And well, Chad Kroeger is unabashedly an asshole--but hey, I guess you gotta appreciate his honesty?

But here's another reason one should well, admire? think better of? I don't know... acknowledge there's a certain level of evil genius to Nickelback: their fame and marketing strategy. Holy cow.

"Kroeger attributes his rise to simple hard work. “I always thought it was strange when these artists like Kurt Cobain or whoever would get really famous and say, ‘I don’t understand why this is happening to me. I don’t understand! Oh, the fame, the fame, the fame!’ ” he says. Nearby, there is a table covered with band photos that they have already signed. Kroeger looks around the room for a moment and then says, “There is a mathematical formula to why you got famous. It isn’t some magical thing that just started happening. And it’s going to move exponentially throughout your career as you grow, or can decline exponentially if you start to fail as an artist.”

The formula for fame includes inviting radio station personnel to hang out backstage to make sure he gets airplay before and after events. And there is always a preshow photo op with radio contest and fan club ticket winners.

Kroeger tends to the band’s image in even the smallest moments. When asked to take pictures with fans, Kroeger will don aviators and strike the same pose nearly every time: one arm around the subject, the other half-raised in a fist with devil horns. There was no chance, either, of a magazine photographing them at smaller venues on their fall tour of more out-of-the-way places like Minsk, Belarus, and Boondall, Australia.

After a short stint with a local manager, they decided to represent themselves and began to put together the Nickelback machine. They figured out how to press CDs, get radio airplay, and book gigs. They bought a Ford Econoline and started touring. “We had zero business plan or experience, but it’s amazing what desperation will do for you,” Peake says. The venture was funded primarily by Peake, who took out $30,000 on a credit line established at a local bank branch in Hanna. It was the same place his father, a farmer, used to finance cattle purchases.

Getting famous in Canada is different from getting famous in the U.S. For one thing, the country mandates all commercial stations to devote 35 percent of their programming to Canadian acts."