It’s a long road to urban recovery, but the Detroit economy is starting to turn around, the Tigers almost made the World Series, and now even the Lions look like beasts in the NFC.

Every recovery has to start somewhere. With the Lions playing they way they have been, this year’s traditional Thanksgiving day game against the undefeated Packers has taken on a whole new meaning. The game means something this year! Detroit will be relevant again! Yay!

Then, news hit early this week that in one fell swoop the NFL dropped a steaming turd right on the city with the announcement that Nickelback would be performing during the halftime show. Not Jack White, not Eminem, not Kid Rock, not a Motown legend, not even Slaughterhouse.

That’s just cruel given Detroit’s musical legacy.

Perhaps buoyed by the signs of resurgence, rather than take the news like a pedophile busted by Chris Hansen, the city launched a petition at Change.org calling for a new band to play during the game.

There’s no indication the NFL and Lions are going to swap out the band, but sometimes the fury of the crowd wins out. Sometimes Bank of America rescinds its $5 debit card-transaction fee. The comments on the petition page are hilarious — full of spit, vinegar, fire and brimstone.

What’s really funny about this, as the Cajun Boy points out at Uproxx, is “Nickelback has sold over 50 million albums worldwide since 1996, and the Beatles are the only foreign act to have sold more albums in the US than they have, so they’re laughing all the way to the bank.”

Still, if ever there was a reason to Occupy Detroit, surely this would be it.

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