Dan Deacon Trolled Barenaked Ladies into Making a Public Apology to Hoobastank

BY Gregory AdamsPublished Sep 8, 2016

Dan Deacon delivered a new single this week, but his most recent master stroke may actually be the prank he pulled on Barenaked Ladies. He led the Canadian combo into thinking they were embroiled in some serious band beef with, uh, Hoobastank.

Deacon revealed in an interview that the sneaky scheme started after he caught a BNL show at Baltimore venue Pier Six Pavilion back in June. There, the onstage Canucks apparently shouted out the loveliness of the venue before getting in a dig at Hoobastank's expense.

"They were like, 'It's a really beautiful space, it's really nice to be up here,'" Deacon told Baltimore's WTMD radio station. "We saw these really nice condos that are built here, but I can't imagine going to sit outside on my waterfront patio and having to listen to Hoobastank soundcheck for about 4 or 5 hours. That would be hell.' And they went into this improv song dissing Hoobastank. At one point, they were like, 'I really hope Hoobastank doesn't hear about this.'"

Amazingly, Deacon and a few friends ended up cooking up a scheme where they sent a floral arrangement to a Barenaked Ladies show in Atlanta, affixed with a card from "Hoobastank," demanding an apology. Best part: the band totally bought it.

The phony request read:

Heard you was talking smack / We are waiting till you say / You are sorry / You've got one week — Hoobastank"

Since the card referenced BNL's massive "One Week" single from the '90s, the Canadian group took to Twitter to address the issue with a few Hoobstank-related puns.
While Hoobstank never ended up getting back to Barenaked Ladies  — "I think they have a label rep who runs their social media. So they never responded," Deacon theorized — Deacon, Diplo and Major Lazer all retweeted the apology.

Though the "Hooba-prank" has yet to be addressed by Hoobastank online, Deacon's hoping an IRL encounter between the two bands will make for an awkward exchange.

"I hope they play a festival together and Barenaked Ladies are like, 'Hey, sorry about that, that was really funny,' and Hoobastank's like, 'What are you talking about?'"

He added: "I feel like I'm going to get an email from someone being like, 'Thanks a lot, jerk.' But it was fun. It cost $60. I actually just got a big photo blanket made up of a screenshot of their tweet. Very happy about it. I love photo blankets."

You can hear Deacon's new "Change Your Life (You Can Do It)" single down below.

 

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