Iowa - Slipknot (2001)
The look my cat, Clementine, gave me when I put this record on this morning kind of says it all.
I don’t know why extreme metal is the only thing I seem to feel the need to apologize for liking. I suppose because it doesn’t make me feel erudite or cultured or cosmopolitan.
We all like a good beat. The whole world gravitates to a verse-chorus-verse song structure with a good refrain. A lot of music lovers of a certain age are very particular about music needing to be “real”: people in a room playing instruments.
Lots of “lyrics-first” sort of fans love a good framing concept in a song lyric, or even a decent pun. Or if you were more of an SST or Dischord Records kid, maybe even a good no-nonsense statement-of-purpose tune.
If most every hit song ever is any indication, songs of longing and heartbreak are pretty okay with everyone as well.
Slipknot has all these things. It’s just that they would also like to reach through your speakers and slam your head into your desk.
Does it speak to some Jungian shadow-self thing, some unackowledged psychological red flag? Probably. But maybe you just don’t want to admit you like it, too.
