I thought it would be impossible to dislike Chad Kroeger and Nickelback any more than I already do.

Turns out I was wrong.

No, I'm not talking about these grudge-rockers' cliche and increasingly tiresome brand of music. I'm talking about something equally cliche and tiresome -- a rock-star lawsuit over royalties.

In case you missed it, Kroeger is now suing former Nickelback drummer Ryan Vikedal, who was reportedly turfed from the band in January. Kroeger, the band's singer, guitarist and songwriter, apparently wants to prevent Vikedal from collecting royalties from songs he recorded with the band -- and force him to return money he has been paid since he left.

Nice, Chad. Real nice.

Granted, this sort of squabbling is nothing new. The Beach Boys have spent decades suing each other. Kurt Cobain reportedly made his Nirvana bandmates give up most of their songwriting royalties. Ozzy even erased old bandmates from his albums to keep them from collecting.

But that doesn't make it right. Like those other guys, Kroeger is -- or at least oughta be -- a multi-millionaire. He could probably buy his blue-collar home town of Hanna, Alta.

Does he really need the 6.5% share of public-performance royalties Vikedal gets from songs like How You Remind Me? Probably not. Is he coming off like a greedy, petty, vindictive jerk? Yes, yes and yes.

How did this happen? I can only guess. Maybe one of the many leeches rich people tend to attract convinced him to screw his old pal. Maybe he simply hates Vikedal and wants him to suffer. Maybe he finally realized that someday the gravy train is going to end and decided he'd better start hoarding all the cash he can.

In any case, we all probably should have seen this coming. After all, Nickelback's new album All the Right Reasons has a song called Rockstar -- supposedly a shot at shallow musicians who want to live an extravagant lifestyle. Listening to it today, you get the sense Kroeger wrote it looking in the mirror.

Even so, this lawsuit is insulting and ridiculous -- like your boss firing you and then coming after your pension. Vikedal put in his time. He spent years with the band. Years of bar gigs. Years of driving across the country in a smelly van. Years of slugging it out and dreaming of stardom. Years of listening to Kroeger write the same damn song over and over and over again. A measly percentage of some public-performance royalties seems like the least he deserves.

Bottom line, Chad: If you don't already have all the money you and your descendants could ever need, maybe you should sue your managers and agents and accountants and business advisers.

In the meantime, why not think of everything you and Ryan went through and do the right thing: Give him his nickel back.