Two prominent Hamilton bands have taken Ontario premier Doug Ford to task over his criticism of the city's NDP representation.

Ford made his comments in the legislature on Tuesday while responding to a question from Conservative MPP Donna Skelly who asked him to "elaborate" on recent economic activity in the area.

"Hamilton has been ignored. It has been run by the NDP, the socialists, who destroyed the city for years," Ford said.

That sentiment didn't sit well with Arkells and Monster Truck, two of Hamilton's most well-known musical groups. Both took to Twitter to criticize the premier.

"Some might say the fortune of rust belt cities has something to do with globalization, and private businesses abandoning their workers for cheaper labour," wrote @arkellsmusic, which has more than 72,000 followers. "But sure, let's blame it on socialists."

The tweet has more than 600 responses and 2,700 likes on Twitter.

Monster Truck's response was a little more strident as this edited-for-a-family-newspaper Tweet shows.

"Not a big political band obviously. But let us be 1000% clear when we say [bleep] you Doug Ford you [bleeping] [bleep] faced piece of dog [bleep]. You wouldn't know what a great city was if it fell out of your crooked broken [bleep.]"

@Monster_Truck has over 20,000 followers.

Hamilton Mayor Fred Eisenberger also weighed in, though he was more diplomatic in his tone.

"There is no reason for him to have a negative view of Hamilton," said Eisenberger. "We are actually in a very positive, upward trend."

dedwards@thespec.com

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