YMMV / Chelsea Grin

• Audience-Alienating Era: Self Inflicted, the band gets points for trying something new, but overall most fans were left wanting more. Alex's deteriorating vocals and poor live showings didn't help either.
• Broken Base: To be expected with a band who is known for changing their sound and lineup:
  • Self Inflicted: To some it’s a logical progression of the band, expanding the deathcore sound they’ve stuck with and incorporating nu-metal in their sound far better than other bands. Others think it's a monotonous slog with atrocious lyrics and nothing worth salvaging.
  • Eternal Nightmare: Is it a breath of fresh air after years of failed experiments and going back to what the band has done best, or is it the same chuggy sound they’ve been playing far too long and all they’re doing is putting lipstick on a pig? The biggest point of contention is the decision to continue on with only one guitarist. It makes sense from a business point of view (less people on the road means more money in the pockets of the band), or it limits the band creatively and they are stuck writing less dense music. The band later privately clarified that the album was written with Alex's vocals in mind before they brought Tom in at the last minute, which explains the simpler sound, and have said that they are going in a heavier direction with their future releases.
  • Alex vs. Tom. For some, Alex was Chelsea Grin and taking him out of the band means the band lost its frontman and creative force. Others think Tom is more than capable fronting Chelsea Grin, and has the technique and talent to help the band go into new directions and Alex’s vocals would have only gotten worse had he stayed in the band.
• First Installment Wins: For all the debate around Chelsea Grin’s material, most agree that Desolation of Eden is their best work.
• Funny Moments:
  • From "Crewcabanger": “It’s boner time!"
  • Jason Richardson's visible irritation and expression of anger when he botched the final run on the solo to "Dust to Dust" at NAMM in 2015 - to be fair, this is a legendarily difficult solo (to the point where they have never played it live), though his reaction is pure "why on earth did I write and record this".
• Growing the Beard: My Damnation is considered this, with the symphonic and black metal influences giving the band more personality than other deathcore bands at the time. Eternal Nightmare is another source of growth, giving the band a much needed second chance at life after some questionable releases.
• Mis-blamed: The infamous "Marge Simpson" video from 2010 is frequently held against Alex Koehler as an example of how horrible his live performances could be, and while Alex would be the first to admit that he had plenty of terrible nights (largely due to his alcohol issues), that was actually not his fault. The fact of the matter is that Andrew Carlston got jumped outside of a venue several nights before, and Alex intervened and tried to protect him, only to get thrown to the ground and kicked in the head, which resulted in a fractured jaw. Alex wasn't supposed to perform live until it had healed and they got an emergency fill-in, but the fill-in was apparently so bad (as per Jake Harmond, he was literally ad-libbing lyrics) that Alex couldn't bear to watch the songs be butchered and also refused to cancel any shows, so he finally forced himself back onstage, and that show happened to be one of the unlucky ones. In short, it was a terrible performance, but considering the circumstances, it's not a reasonable thing to hold against him.
• Narm: A criticism of many of Alex's lyrics, particularly his later ones, and "Clickbait" in particular was lambasted for being cringeworthy even by his standards.
  "I did your fucking work for you.
  Go ahead and publish every word I said to you.
  Emphasize the fact that you're a fucking bitch.
  And while you're at it, you can publish this dick."
• Overshadowed by Controversy: While Tom Barber was originally very well-received and helped rejuvenate the band after a long and steady decline that paralleled Alex Koehler's own, his increasingly vocal rants about conspiracy theories on his personal Instagram (including some ambiguous but very likely expressions of QAnon sympathies) coupled with his anti-vaccination sentiment gradually soured the fanbase more and more on him, and after the band had to cancel a festival appearance in 2021 for reasons that were strongly hinted to be because of his refusal to get vaccinated, numerous fans began to view him as an embarrassment to his own band who was actively hindering them.
• Signature Song: "Recreant" and "Don’t Ask Don’t Tell" for the Alex Koehler era, "Hostage" and "Dead Rose" for the Tom Barber era.
• Win Back the Crowd: Eternal Nightmare had a lot of concerns going into it, being the first release without Alex and the first with only one guitarist. “Dead Rose” and “Hostage” proved those concerns weren’t needed and it saw Chelsea Grin doing better than ever, doing their biggest headlining tours yet.