Throbbing Member
I've gotta disagree about the drums, or at least the earlier ones. David Silveria was probably the most talented member of the band. His beats were a nice fusion of hip-hop and heavy rock. I would say he is almost on par with Abe Cunningham of Deftones.Originally Posted by tony.parente
Last edited by wight rabbit; 08-12-2020 at 07:05 PM.
Active Member
Difficult to disagree with much of that. They were (mostly) purveyors of the genre and hit at just the right time. For the last however many albums they've stuck to a pretty basic songwriting formula that seems to work.
Stubby Member
I couldnt agree more, they are as a whole greater than the sum of their parts. They're one of the most unique bands who ever existed
I was having this debate recently with a long time friend. Both of us were big Korn fans back in the late 90s/early 00s as teenagers, and the into our 20s moved on. Recently in our early mid 30s (probably not coincidentally around the time Head came back) we heard a few newer Korn songs and we're actually kinda shocked by how much we enjoyed them.
And it hit me - Korn has always been Korn. They're one of the few artists that have always just been themselves. They've never been afraid to try what they wanted to, or afraid to suck/have people not like them. They're fucking genuine, unique, and it's incredibly refreshing today and has always been what made them appealing to their fans I think, even if we're not always aware of it.
It's also impressive they've managed stay relevant, and not really lose what made them them at their peak after they've all gotten sober. If you listen to those early albums (especially Issues, which I think is easily their masterpiece in terms of sound and concept) it's no surprise they were all on a lot of meth among other things. I mean where else would those kind of hi-pitched haunted guitar parts come from?
House Always Wins
One thing I always enjoyed about this band (I'm kind of a passer by fan these days. Not super into them but not a hater.) is how those early albums had a very unsettling feeling to them when you listened. Korn, Life Is Peachy and Issues (Minus the hits, fuck Follow the Leader) have a distinct sound and atmosphere they never recaptured to me. I know a lot of JD's lyrics deal with abuse and his childhood but the imagery conjured up in the vocals, the delivery of the lyrics and how the music just morphed around them is just...dirty. They have good production but the records always sounded dirtier and more disturbing than it would normally make you think.
Or maybe I'm making shit up?
I don't know.
Banned
I haven't listened to them in 10 years. I look at them like an ex girlfriend. I moved on. I have reached such elitist snobbery levels in my music fandom that I would probably be embarrassed to even give them another chance even though I admit that Issues and Life Is Peachy are still pretty cool albums....Even as recently as 2010, I had to defend listening to them to my fellow music elitist friends......I dont know if there is another band out there whose image has affected the way their music is perceived as much as Korn. They will always be defined as the whole baggy pants, dreadlocked, Adidas tracksuit, chain wallets, jump up and get da fuc up nu metal band and always be tied to that scene. They cant escape it. If they didnt dress like they were in Cypress Hill in the mid 90s and didnt align themselves with such piece of trash bands like Limp Bizkit, maybe they would have gone the same route as the Deftones and Faith No More (2 bands who got dangerously close to being classified in the nu metal genre and then totally abandoned it and made their own paths)...Instead they seemed content to cater to that audience long past nu metals expiration date. I remember when Chino downright refused to tour with them in 2003 and basically had to be forced to do that 2006 tour
Last edited by Helpmeiaminhell (is now in hell); 08-12-2020 at 10:51 PM.
Throbbing Member
Nah, you are right on money, to some extend I think this dirty sound is still present within them, it is kind of what they are known for. I think one of the things that seperates them the most from others and what creates this disturbing sound is the fact they have bass guitar being in the center rather than in the background a lot of the times, I feel like the bass guitar is a huge trademark of their sound, even though the bass guitar doesn't know music theory and doesn't apparently like playing it, his style is a huge part of their sound which gives it this unpleasant dark feeling to it. And as some who loves bass guitar I really love that.
There are other stuff that compliment it, it's everything, really, but the bass guitar is the thing that always stood out to me.
Last edited by HWB; 08-13-2020 at 02:04 AM.
Throbbing Member
And I dunno, I feel like people are being little harsh when people call Korn a bad band with bad musicians but then say they have "so many great records though", nah, bad bands don't make good albums, period, I think that goes without saying, I feel like a lot of people have subscribed to what music snobs told them to believe and are rather unfair to this band as a whole, you guys know that System Of A Down also played with Limp Bizkit and hanged around with them? Almost everyone from that era did, these Alt. Metal/Nu Metal band were often together one way or another.
It isn't Korn's fault really that douchebags got attracted to their music, the way Korn dressed had nothing to do with it, they made aggressive music that was popular which attracted douchebags, this happened to many bands and you can rarely do anything with it, hell it happened with NIN for a while too and as we all know NIN has no connection to nu metal at all, also Pantera, of course. The more popular music gets the more its underlying message gets ignored, it is fairly obvious that Korn almost always wrote from the perspective of an outsider who was abused, the fact jocks who ignored this got attracted to their music is a silly criticism, even Limp Bizkit themselves wrote from that perspective of an outsider yet jocks took over that (in a far bigger sense with the case of Limp Bizkit).
And rap thing? They don't really tend to rap really all that much Follow The Leader, sure, but that doesn't really represent their sound all that well..but the concept of Rap Rock/Rap Metal itself isn't bad or dated...Rage Against The Machine, anyone? I mean, either way, they don't really rap in their songs, they influenced some Hip-Hop/Funk beats into their music but that was obviously greatly inspired from other Metal bands they were obviously inspired by such as Godflesh and Faith No More who are obviously great bands, so again, dimissing "rap rock/metal" seems kind of silly to me. This "funk" they have going on is a big part of their sound and they greatly benefit from it, I think most people wouldn't say otherwise.
I have also explored a lot of music and have since realized that a lot of what I liked didn't have much of merit or after exploring other musicians there wasn't much for me, but I also am fair with what I am hearing rather than what community surrounded or how it was seen in the past.
Last edited by HWB; 08-13-2020 at 02:18 AM.
The Virus Inside
I always joke that KoRn is the new AC/DC.
You know exactly what you're getting going into a KoRn record, and they pump them out so fast (They're on 13 records, which is more than some bands who have been releasing music well before them...)
They have a very distinctive sound.
You can easily recognize a KoRn song a million miles away from the baseline alone.
But sometimes it's nice to reminisce about said ex and think about, maybe... all that could have been?
We all have that 1 ex that "we let get away" lol.
Kinda like TOOL fans? lol.
I feel like the music/message is going over a lot of TOOL fans' heads.
It seems like over the years TOOL's audience has changed, for the worse.
Last edited by ManBurning; 08-13-2020 at 02:37 AM.
Banned
They embraced the douche factor big time around Follow The Leader. 'All In the Family' w Fred Durst is the biggest cringe song this side of 'Unskinny Bop' by Poison
Throbbing Member
It was just for one song, besides, that song is obviously tongue and cheek and Jonathan absolutely hates that song, I think he wrote it while drunk? Either way there is nothing douchey in that song, it's just two people doing awful disses at each other in a weird friendly matter.
But yeah, it's cringe, but not like in a douchey way..just in an embarassing way. VERY embarassing way. I cannot defend this song's quality, no one really can. The rest of the album has little bit more of a playful atmosphere but I would not say it is like remotely close to anything Limp Bizkit would do.
Right after that was "Issues" which went back into the darker themes straight from the get-go, just with a really clean production.
Banned
I still think Issues is their best work. That should have been the followup to Life Is Peachy.....Follow The Leader was to Korn what Nevermind was to Nirvana....The radio friendly glossy produced starter pack all tied neatly together for the casual fans and MTV and radio
Throbbing Member
Yeah, I do agree with this, I still think it is a good album at its core and in the end we still got Issues which I think is amazing, it took the production of "Leader" and combined it with the darkness and heaviness of the records before "Leader".
The Virus Inside
Active Member
Totally forgot about this song...
The Virus Inside
I feel like this article is kind of along the lines of what we've been talking about here the last few pages,
Why do people hate Korn’s Issues album when it’s clearly brilliant?
https://www.loudersound.com/features...qAI57V24M1JguI
Banned
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/r...n-korns-legacy
'Do Korn Fans Ruin Korns Legacy"
This sums it up
House Always Wins
As a quick aside, the album art is also an iconic 1990's metal album staple. I remember seeing that sack doll everywhere in the early 2000's. There was a sticker vending machine at the local bowling alley I used to be in a league at (1997-2009). Two of the stickers that were front in center were the Deftones Around the Fur billiards ball logo and the Korn Issues doll.
Last edited by Space Suicide; 08-16-2020 at 12:10 PM.
Throbbing Member
Jesus it feels good to hear this again! I had the whole Korn discography on my old hard drive that got erased accidentally a while back, so I've ended up losing the whole thing and not listening in a while.
Korn was my first gig when I was 12 years old in 2002, and my gateway into music through my dad who had the first few albums on CD that we used to listen to. I will always have time for them - they have an undeniably original sound that still holds up in how primal it sounds.
Last edited by Jord; 08-16-2020 at 12:05 PM.
House Always Wins
My faves of the aforementioned
Active Member
I still have my Sick And Twisted Tour variant of the plush Korn Doll on display in my house. That album artwork is suuuper fucking iconic.
Active Member
Pick one song for each category: Overrated, underrated, favorite, least favorite
O Blind
U Starting Over
F No One's There
L K@#ø%!
Active Member
O: It's really a toss up between Freak On A Leash or Got The Life
U: Oildale
F: Dirty
L: probably All In The Family tbh
Matador de Froot Loops
O: Falling Away from Me
U: Did my time
F: Thoughtless
L: Get Up!
Active Member
Korn is doing a livestream concert on Saturday, April 24th. I'm in.
https://kornlive.com/
Active Member
O: Did My Time
U: Reclaim My Place because it is the last Korn song to feature the classic David Silveria chaotic-snare-roll
F: Chi
L: All In The Family gets a skip every time. Cool instrumental though
Has anyone seen David lately?
He looks like he sells HGH in the gym parking lot. It's a bit sad.
Let's take a min to remember how great he was at creating memorable and energetic grooves that laid the foundation of the classis Korn sound.
Active Member
Silveria's recent and current bands, as well as his ridiculous physical appearance now, are a popular running gag on the interwebs in places where this kinda stuff pops up. I've linked to his stuff in the Shitty Music thread in the past. Comedy gold.
Active Member
You made me the google the guy to see what he's been doing. I remember he left because of his wrists and he wanted to own a restaurant but that was a long time ago. Now I see that he's been drumming in two different bands and that he "hasn't listened to any Korn since he left." That sounds like the kind of thing that someone who has listened to every song since he left would say.
Active Member
Anyone catching the Monumental stream right now? Looked up the setlist and it's pretty damn good. Debating if I actually want to buy a ticket and watch it or not. I'm curious as to how the Stranger Things shit is incorporated into the performance.
Active Member
Just looked it up. Would have been the perfect time to break out some deep cuts.
Cubby NIИtastic
After not giving an ounce of shit about this band in at least 20 years, I checked this show out and it felt like catching up with an old friend. Might have to give the new album (or even their last few albums) a spin; was really thoroughly impressed with their performance. Fieldy is a beast on the bass. Glad to see these guys are still doing their thing.
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