Corey Taylor on the upcoming Slipknot tour with Korn

On Monday UK metal fans were treated to the fantastic news that the heavyweight duo of Slipknot and Korn were touring together in January. Upon hearing this news we chatted to our mate Corey Taylor about it all – you can hear the full interview this Friday on the Metal Hammer Radio Show...

There’s big news in the world of Slipknot, big news in the world of metal, and indeed the UK – the Prepare For Hell Tour has just been announced. A lot of seeming seminal Slipknot gigs have happened in the UK, in a roundabout’s sense. Does it feel like a bit of a homecoming to you guys?

“Oh absolutely, you know, it’s like a home away from home basically. I actually put this in our press release. In a lot of ways the UK is where it all started for us. I can remember going over and playing that first show in London in December of ’99. It was a handful of days after my birthday and just being so stoked to be there. Then, playing The Astoria, which isn’t even there anymore, which is blasphemy by the way, and the level of insanity in that room is to this day, it’s still palpable. I can still feel it, like I think about it and the goosebumps come up, the cold sweats, the PTSD, I mean, it gets very, very crazy. It’s still, to me, one of the best shows we’ve ever played.”

**Do you feel like that was really a turning point, that when you came here and things kind of exploded you were able to go back to The States with a renewed kind of confidence? **

“Well, I think it helped us, it showed us that we were appealing to something other than the American crowd. And there’s nothing wrong with that, but for us, we had always had a global vision. We wanted to take this as far around the world as possible and once we felt like we had the foot in we knew we were onto something, so it was just onwards and upwards from there.”

I’m sure that a lot of people over this side of the pond remember those shows very well indeed. Now speaking of the upcoming ones, an interesting thing was noted on the advertisements that have gone around. It doesn’t say, ‘Supported by Korn,’ it says, ‘With our brothers Korn.’ Do you remember meeting those guys for the first time, because I guess around the time of your debut they were the big kids on the block?

“They were definitely. I mean, not only were they the band that we loved, but we also aspired to what they had. It wasn’t until a handful of years later that we actually got to meet them and we got to know them, we got to be very close with them, to the point where now. It’s very weird to think that Jonathan Davis has me on a first name basis. It’s crazy when the bands you look up to become your peers, that’s a pretty big statement to what you’ve done, especially with that band because I have so much respect for what they’ve been able to do and what they’ve accomplished, and just how far they’ve been able to push their music. I mean, it’s fantastic. This is something that we’ve been trying to put together for a very, very long time. Just putting together a tour with them and finally, finally we get to do it and it just felt like the right time. They were available, we were ready to do it and the rest is going to be history.”

Listen to the full interview on the Metal Hammer Radio Show this Friday at 8pm BST on TeamRock Radio and DAB.

Alexander Milas is an erstwhile archaeologist, broadcaster, music journalist and award-winning decade-long ex-editor-in-chief of Metal Hammer magazine. In 2017 he founded Twin V, a creative solutions and production company. In 2019 he launched the World Metal Congress, a celebration of heavy metal’s global impact and an exploration of the issues affecting its community. His other projects include Space Rocks, a festival space exploration in partnership with the European Space Agency and the Heavy Metal Truants, a charity cycle ride which has raised over a million pounds for four children's charities which he co-founded with Iron Maiden manager Rod Smallwood. He is Eddietor of the official Iron Maiden Fan Club, head of the Heavy Metal Cycling Club, and works closely with Earth Percent, a climate action group. He has a cat named Angus.