Shots Fired! Our thoughts on the Frontliner & Wildstylez situation.

Last Friday, the 14th of August, what was meant to be a day filled with good vibes and excitement for Decibel Outdoor suddenly transformed into a forecast of cloudy with a chance of an egotistic shitstorm. Always known as ‘the melodyman,’ Frontliner was highly regarded for his undying connection with his fans, love for animals and the environment and the fact that he generously offers his sound samples to budding producers. However, one of his recent status updates on Facebook proved otherwise as many fans began re-evaluating whether they agree with his online persona or not.

Having a slight rat on former hardstyle idols Headhunterz and Showtek, Frontliner continued to state that the word ‘hardstyle’ is nothing more than a marketing tool and saying the word doesn’t show any commitment at all? So Fronty, what exactly does show commitment? I’m sure that Headhunterz and Showtek stayed in hardstyle as long as they humanly could and maybe they didn’t want to commit to releasing music that didn’t have their whole heart in it. Secondly, with all due respect to Frontliner and his great music but I also found it necessary to mention that he is one of the artists who continuously posts hardstyle related memes, “I <3 Hardstyle” images and other ‘viral paraphernalia’ which could be seen as one of his marketing tactics.

Subsequent to this status update, pioneering artist Wildstylez seemed to be outraged by Frontliner’s post and decided to take matters into his own hands and voice his opinion. Just from looking at Wildstylez’ social media, it’s blatantly obvious that his attitude on his social outlets is more laidback and down-to-Earth; it is also a huge contrast to Frontliner’s over-the-top ‘dedicated’ persona.

Many interesting comments followed this post as fans jumped in to voice their opinions and support these two conflicting viewpoints. From my view, I don’t mean to be biased but I 100% stand behind Wildstylez for quite a few reasons. Don’t get me wrong, I do respect Frontliner and he’s created some amazing music in the past and present, however his approach to social media is simply something that I can’t personally connect to; it’s as if he’s writing status updates that are aimed at a young and immature market. In the past (and even now) he has posted a lot of unnecessary ‘hardstyle forever’ and crowd-pleasing stuff – those kinds of posts completely conflict with the notion of ‘music speaking for itself.’ If anyone walks around with the word ‘marketing tool’ on their heads, it’s Frontliner (no offense).

Reviewing the situation from Wildstylez’ end, it’s no doubt that he has a calmer and more humble approach to social media. Over the last years and in the status update, there were many comments being made about Wildstylez being next to move to house, despite staying extremely loyal to hardstyle, releasing an album and always being honest about his position in the scene. It’s always hard to continuously deal with criticism and sometimes I feel like the haters online actually want an artist to move over to house just for the dramatic impact. Therefore Frontliner’s status would have undoubtedly hit a nerve or two and knowing Wildstylez’ usual calm persona, Frontliner must have been doing annoying shit online for quite a while – someone this calm doesn’t snap over nothing.

With all said and done, one thing’s for sure – the hardstyle scene seriously thrives on drama.

In the end, this is just our viewpoint on the situation and how we feel about certain types of online personas. There’s really no right or wrong and this is what makes these situations between artists and their conflicting personalities so interesting, everyone will always take side to someone who they draw more relevance with, in this case we are more on side with Wildstylez.

So, now is your time to tell us what you think about this – leave your comments below!