YouTuber KDH has made title for himself calling out others – be they guitarists or manufacturers – within the guitar house. And the newest to seek out themselves in his crosshairs is Brandon D’Eon, a well-liked YouTuber with over 800,000 subscribers.

It comes after KDH – who himself boasts over 110,000 subscribers on the platform – found an outdated video posted to Brandon’s channel which noticed him approaching guitar manufacturers stationed on the 2024 NAMM Present asking free of charge devices.

KDH subsequently posted a video to his channel titled ‘The WORST Guitar YouTuber I’ve ever Seen”, itemizing the methods he felt Brandon had been impolite in his strategy to mentioned manufacturers.

Whereas it’s not unusual for manufacturers to work with influencers within the guitar house – with many such offers seeing these influencers furnished with free devices in alternate for publicity or publicity – KDH takes a problem with how Brandon communicated with the manufacturers he approached. “The actual drawback is the way it was executed,” he says.

“As an alternative of Brandon approaching individuals and types with respect… he selected the choice to simply stroll up and demand free stuff, pondering that everyone would recognise him as the large star that he thinks he’s,” he continues.

KDH’s video has since gone viral, amassing properly over 300,000 views in simply six days, and the pair have since had a dialog to straighten issues out. And fortunate for us, that dialog was recorded, and may now be seen on KDH’s channel.

“A number of the issues that you just mentioned in that video [were] very reasonable…” Brandon tells KDH. “I did act in a method that was not tremendous well mannered. I used to be a little bit of an ass.”

Brandon contends, nonetheless, that his extra “aggressive” and inflated “ego” was a persona, and never a real reflection of himself. “In my head, I believed that I did need to act like a bit smug to create engagement,” he explains. “I’m not saying I used to be proper to do this, however I’m simply attempting to elucidate the place my head was at.”

However when Brandon notes that his “yelling” at model reps was a part of this persona and efficiency, KDH is fast to level out the distinction between yelling at a digicam for engagement and yelling at actual individuals.

“If I file a video and I’m being aggressive or impolite, it’s not directed at anyone,” he explains. “If you take that [performed aggression and] converse straight to at least one individual, then it’s directed at them.”

KDH additionally raises the purpose that these working at NAMM need to take care of less-than-ideal situations, purely by advantage of the character of the present. “If you’re working NAMM you’re listening to 50 guitar gamers play 50 completely different songs at 50 completely different tunings [all at once] and it’s simply horrible,” he explains. “Then they’ve received two cameras on them, they know that it’s going to go on YouTube. They’ve to simply settle for no matter is alleged, as a result of it displays on the corporate.”

Once more, freebies in alternate for publicity is an element and parcel of the guitar house – and certainly many different markets. However the backlash just lately confronted by Brandon D’Eon is a reminder that the way you would possibly strategy manufacturers as an influencer remains to be essential, and blindly pursuing engagement metrics like views – and adopting abrasive personas within the course of – is perhaps counterproductive…