Music critic Anthony Fantano has now issued his own video response to the video shared earlier this month by Falling In Reverse vocalist Ronnie Radke. Radke‘s aforementioned video was released several weeks ago on August 07th. In it, he announced that he had lost the defamation suit he had filed against Fantano back in August of 2024. That complaint was put forth in relation to a video Fantano had originally released regarding Radke in August of 2023, ‘This Guy Sucks‘.
In that 2023 video, Fantano offered severe critiques of Radke, outlining the various allegations that have been made against the multi-platinum musician, in addition to Radke‘s past run-ins with the law. Fantano also condemned Radke for the way he conducts himself, his past actions, and more. In Radke‘s original complaint, he went on to claim:
“Fantano‘s nearly eight-minute verbal tirade regarding Radke——whom the defendant does not know and has never even met——goes beyond the bounds of permissible commentary and extends into the realm of actionable innuendo, unfounded rumormongering and outright untruth.”
Roughly a year after that suit was brought forward, the matter was resolved in court in Fantano‘s favor. Radke was the first to announce that resolution, uploading this video statement earlier this month. During that video, he claimed that he was advised by his lawyer that he would lose defamation suit he filed against Fantano, before going on to repeat various claims and allegations made against Fantano that have cropped over the years and again in recent months.
Since then, Fantano has also been a repeated target of ire and mockery from Radke, with footage and commentary of Fantano being played at Falling In Reverse shows, and also appearing on social media accounts associated with Radke. Earlier this week, Fantano issued this video, outlining his side of the defamation suit and the outcome of it. In that video Fantano explained that he filed an anti-SLAPP motion in response to Radke‘s suit, with the judge ultimately siding with him, ordering Radke to cover Fantano‘s legal fees.
In a video post made yesterday, August 30th, Fantano has now individually gone through Radke‘s August 07th statement regarding his loss in that suit, focusing on the various claims and statements made by Radke. Fantano prefaced that response by offering the following [transcribed by theprp.com]:
“Ronald, I know you’re watching. Remember this: no matter what I say in this video, no matter what you say in this video, and no matter what is said after this point in time, I want you to always remember — always have in your head —you lost your lawsuit to me, and you had to pay me my legal fees.
So again, thank you for that. Nothing you whine about or complain about in this video changes that. Not one little bit. You took the L, that is the fact of the matter, and let’s watch you cope and seethe.”
In a new video shared this afternoon (August 31st) after Fantano‘s latest response, Radke fired back, repeating allegations of racism and homophobia against Fantano, while slamming him for his “moral superiority complex”, among other condemnatory statements. Radke later went on to slam the notion of fans relying on celebrity music critics to influence their opinion, before going on to seemingly imply that his campaign against Fantano was in part also for fans of bands that have been reviewed or judged poorly by Fantano. Radke stated:
“I know this motherf*cker has been sweating because my fans have literally been going the f*ck off and riding for me, and I really appreciate that, because I’m not gonna tell them to slow down. You know why? Because this motherf*cker does everything in his power to try to make money off the backs of musicians that really work hard. And he’s so biased about it.
…This is for all the Sleep Token fans. This is for all the f*cking Muse fans. This is for all the f*cking Falling In Reverse fans. This is for all the people that f*cking literally love their favorite bands. And you know this guy’s coming in with some b*llshit. This is for those guys.”
