The New Song from Indie Metal Band ‘TO DIE FOR’ was Inspired by Negative Experiences Within the ‘Terrifier’ Community
TO DIE FOR turns a terrible experience into a message of support for people going through a similar situation.
updated on
For Matt Bolea, the harsh reality he saw within a major Terrifier fan community was an eye-opener. It altered his view on a community and industry he’d been excited about getting more involved in. Now, with the release of his band’s newest song, he hopes to continue opening eyes.
The band is To Die For, and the song is “ASSKISS.” Released on November 10th, 2025, “ASSKISS” was directly inspired by Matt Bolea’s experiences within the “Art the Clown Appreciation Society” (ATCAS) group. A sampling of the “ASSKISS” lyrics includes lines like, “so hypocritical, but they keep their pockets full, whose side are you on?” So, you can probably see how his ATCAS experiences went. But to get the full effect of the emotion poured into the song, we need to look at the whole picture.
Table of Contents
The Current Climate
The release of “ASSKISS” comes amid an ongoing story that started in late October when news broke (as seen in Variety) about Catherine Corcoran suing the producers of Terrifier (2016). A few days later Steve Barton shared his story with IndieWire, saying that his relationship with director Damien Leone and producer Phil Falcone soured after he put in years of hard work supporting the franchise. Barton admits in the article that his complaints aren’t actionable under the law, but his claims describe a darker side to the franchise’s business dealings.
Then just last week, an interview with Matt Bolea was published by IndieWire which appears to show that the dark pattern of behavior extends even further. In short, Bolea’s story positions him as a willing representative for independent artists who have had negative interactions with members of the Terrifier team, but who can’t or won’t speak out due to a fear of “legal and social retaliation.” Bolea says he faced the social side of that retaliation firsthand, so now he’s chosen to act as a voice for those who remain silent. With TO DIE FOR’s new song, he’s literally voicing his frustration for the whole world to hear.
The Beginning
We spoke to Matt Bolea about his years-long journey that led him to recording “ASSKISS” with his TO DIE FOR bandmates. It all started a few years ago with fan art he created featuring Art the Clown. His Art art became popular within the ATCAS group, and he began getting requests from other members for t-shirts featuring his designs. After looking into how to print shirts, he did it, and the popularity of his work increased. As seen in the IndieWire article, he even got a shout-out from David Howard Thornton about his designs.
This inspired Bolea to start a brand, called “2Die4,” through which he would sell apparel printed with his fan-art designs. As Bolea told us, “It built notoriety within the group based from fans, admins, and even actors showing tons of love and support; financially as well.”
2Die4 started small, but it began to gain traction. He was selling fan art which, at best, exists within a legal grey area. However, as quoted from his IndieWire interview when talking about his sales, Bolea said “I knew [the Terrifier team] was aware of that. It was obvious.” Many companies turn a blind eye to fan art, especially if it’s lower-scale in terms of sales and isn’t harmful to the property. Many people sell fan art, and many fans want fan art. But, Bolea told us that by the holiday season of 2023, “I realized I was making more money than I felt comfortable with and wanted to ensure I was going about it the right, or at least most fair way.”
Bolea told us that’s when he sought a license from Phil Falcone to sell Terrifier merchandise featuring his own designs. He was turned down. “Phil Falcone did not want to license my work, which was fine,” said Bolea. He found the decision to be “confusing and upsetting,” but he accepted it. That was the end of it. Or at least, he thought that was the end of it.
The Backlash
The very same night Bolea was turned down by Falcone, he received a call from one of the moderators of the ATCAS group. Bolea says the admin, someone who Bolea understands “has direct connections” to Phil Falcone, “absolutely trashed Phil to me.”
After that, Bolea says that more people reached out to him about their own experiences with certain members of the Terrifier team. “From that phone call going forward into the rest of the week, more of them reached out to tell me so much BS that I had NO business ever knowing,” he told us.
Seeing this new, hidden side of the story from people who praised Falcone publicly prompted Bolea to take action. As he said to us, “I eventually spoke up because I was over seeing how two-faced these people were, and they spun it all back on me to protect themselves and ruin my reputation.” IndieWire described the backlash as an “intense campaign” to discredit Bolea as “obsessive” and “delusional.” Bolea expanded on this, telling us that when he started to talk about his experience, “they IMMEDIATELY began to post publicly about their praise and love for Phil Falcone. It was kind of hilarious looking back.”
The Band
The frustration and disappointment stemming from the events within the ATCAS group coincided with life events that would test anyone’s resolve. “Dealing with this, plus a divorce affecting my three beautiful kids, plus my dad diagnosed with lung cancer, all at the time; I broke, I hit rock bottom,” said Bolea. But as time passed, Bolea rebuilt.
Part of the rebuilding process included a shift from 2Die4 the brand, to TO DIE FOR the band. Bolea says that the formation of TO DIE FOR came from conversations he had with Tyler Morris, his current bandmate and one of his best friends. Bolea told us, “[Tyler] would randomly call me at the most bat shit weird hours of the night for years just to see how I was doing. When I told him some of my struggles, his reply was always, ‘So, when are we gonna write about it?'”
Bolea says that Morris knew that music would be a healthy outlet for Bolea’s issues, and Bolea had been a part of the local music scene for years anyway, so it all felt right. As he puts it, “After realizing this industry was not something I could justify taking too much more part in, I thought back to those calls from him and finally decided, yeah… time to write.”
The Song
If you check out TO DIE FOR’s Spotify, you’ll see that “ASSKISS” isn’t the first single they’ve released. It’s their fourth so far, but knowing how Matt’s personal journey is the inspiration makes it feel like it might be their most personal song. If you listen, it sounds like there’s a lot of anger behind the music. But when asked, Bolea says there’s a more nuanced point that he wants to get across.
Bolea wants listeners “to understand that every voice matters, every creator matters, and to never assume someone is powerless just because you feel a sense of superiority over them based on a falsified public perception. The more you try to flaunt that false sense of superiority, the harder you will fall when eventually fuck with the wrong one.”
As the press release sent to us by TO DIE FOR describes, “ASSKISS” was written on April 6th of this year and originally scheduled for release in October. Scheduling conflicts resulted in a November release instead, which just happened to coincide with Terrifier popping up in the news in a negative way.
Bolea told us that the original plan wasn’t to be so straightforward with the public about the specific inspiration behind the song, but recent news allowed them to be more open about it. “We planned on this being much more subtle, like a ‘iykyk’ type of deal. Once the news broke though, and it was coincidentally right before we planned on releasing the song, there was no reason to be subtle about it anymore.”
I asked Bolea about his personal reaction to the song, and whether it was a more cathartic experience writing and hearing for the first time, or when it was released to the public. His response: “Releasing it to the public. We are already seeing backlash, which is expected. But we have so many more people thanking us for doing something that not enough people do, which is having the guts to speak up publicly and stand on business. So, the hope is that our decision to come out the gates fearlessly and fight for others, will encourage others to keep doing the same. And that’s what it’s all about; fighting the good fight.”
The Point
As indicated by the IndieWire article, and confirmed to us by Matt Bolea himself, there are more stories out there from people who feel mistreated and undervalued. Those aren’t his stories to tell, but they relate the the message he hopes to spread. In his own words, Bolea says that being open about his story and the inspiration behind TO DIE FOR’s new song comes down to wanting “to make sure anyone else who was afraid to speak up would see the extent we are willing to go to stand up for them and support them, and hopefully give them that validation and courage to stand up for themselves too.”
For Matt Bolea personally, the whole ordeal has been a major learning experience. As he told us, “I wouldn’t be as strong as I am, nor as knowledgeable and unforgiving as I am when it comes to protecting and supporting true independent artists, and anyone else who gets chewed up and spit out in this industry.”
As for advice to any independent artist or fan-art creator going through a situation similar to his? He had this to say:
“Document everything and take screenshots! But seriously (while that is still serious), grow your closest bonds to the people who constructively critique you. Stay away from anyone in business who give you nothing but praise. Stay humble. There’s always someone better than you out there, and those are the people who should be your best friends. Learn from them; don’t envy them. And for the love of god, don’t sign any paperwork without consulting a lawyer.”
LISTEN!
Check out TO DIE FOR: beacons.ai/todieforrva
TO DIE FOR ARE:
- Matt Bolea (vocals)
- Tyler Morris (vocals)
- Joseph Sauret (guitar/production)
- Ford Wesson (guitar)
- Music mixed and mastered by Ricky Jabarin
