Ex-KORN drummer David Silveria says that his former band was responsible for pioneering the so-called “nu metal ‘genre.
KORN‘s self-titled debut, which came out in 1994, went on to sell more than 10 million copies worldwide and featured the band’s first classic, “Blind”. The LP is credited with launching the nu metal movement, setting the template for albums from bands like DEFTONES, LIMP BIZKIT, COAL CHAMBER and others.
Essentially a fusion of rap and alternative rock (arguably born out of RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE), nu metal inexplicably swept the airwaves and peaked for a brief period in the late ’90s and early 2000s, with Gregory Heaney of AllMusic describing the genre as “one of metal’s more unfortunate pushes into the mainstream.” Along the way, several bands associated with nu metal, including KORN, DEFTONES and SLIPKNOT, took a somewhat defensive stance against being labeled as such. Even those less apologetic nu metal groups eventually changed their sound, effectively disowning the genre that they helped pioneer.
Asked in a new interview with the “Talk Toomey” podcast how he feels about the fact that so many other bands owe their careers to KORN, Silveria said: “I can’t tell you how many people told me we created this new genre of metal, nu metal, and I don’t really know how to take it. I do agree that we changed the music scene and put the course of heavy music on a different route. I just feel like me — I don’t feel, like, ‘Oh, I did something. I changed the whole entire scene.’ It’s not a feeling that I have. I’ve heard it so many times, I don’t really understand it. But I guess we did — for all intents and purposes, I guess we did kind of change the scene and created this new genre called nu metal.”
In a 2017 interview Italy’s Linea Rock, Silveria‘s replacement, Ray Luzier, said that he doesn’t consider KORN to be a “nu metal” band. “To me, I don’t know what that is,” he said. “Anyone could make a style up. I don’t know… all of these emo [bands], I don’t get it. To me, KORN is KORN. It’s its own thing. It’s hard rock, it’s metal, it’s hip-hop, it’s funk…all of this stuff wrapped into one. It’s not just aggressive metal music. I can’t call it metal, but hard rock doesn’t fit either. It’s KORN. It’s the style. [Laughs]”
KORN guitarist James “Munky” Shaffer concurred, telling “Whiplash” back in 2016: “I think it’s difficult to put us in a category, and I think, in the beginning, that’s why somebody — whoever it was; some European journalist — said, ‘We don’t know what to call these guys, so we’re gonna call it ‘nu metal.’ I think that’s where that term came from.”
Silveria‘s current band, BREAKING IN A SEQUENCE (a.k.a. BIAS), released a new single last month called “Delusional”.
David is joined in the Orange County, California-based group by bassist Chris Dorame, guitarists Joe Taback and Mike Martin and singer Rich Nguyen.
Silveria, Dorame and Taback previously played together in CORE 10, which “imploded” in 2018 after releasing a couple of singles and playing a number of local shows.
