In the fifth of a six-part interview with Terry “Beez” Bezer of Knotfest.com‘s “Mosh Talks With Beez”, SLIPKNOT percussionist and co-founder M. Shawn “Clown” Crahan was asked if he and his bandmates have considered staging a livestream concert during the coronavirus pandemic. He responded (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “In my opinion, it’s just too soon. I mean, the vaccine isn’t even available to everyone yet. We can’t fully explain what happened to the White House. We don’t even understand what the hell’s going on with our own problems as humans, let alone try to put together a livestream and make it translate to someone like you who wants it so badly in the room you’re in. I take that very, very, very, very serious… The point is, for SLIPKNOT, being a very visual band, and beyond the art side of it, the music side… I mean, I don’t know how I get together with everybody on lockdown, go through a set to make special for you, where we are convinced that it’s coming through to you absolutely the way you need it. I need time for that. I don’t know if everybody’s got time. We’re not even allowed to get out of the house in some places.
“I do realize many bands have done it, and I realize it works,” he continued. “I realize fans like it. But for SLIPKNOT, I don’t see it being much longer. A live album never even came to mind. A livestream — I have people breathing down my neck about a livestream. I will not waste money on a livestream, because if I am, it’s gotta be wasted on you. I can’t just get with a bunch of people that, all of a sudden, may or may not be working and aren’t used to taking two and a half years off and having to figure out what to do.
“So when you ask me, ‘Why don’t you do it?’, how am I gonna get the time and all these people together to give you the exquisite, beautiful art thing that you’re needing so badly?” Crahan asked rhetorically. “And if I don’t do it, and you see it, and you’re, like, ‘Man…’ For example, let’s say I don’t use explosives. And I’m, like, ‘But I tried to make it an intimate setting in a theater.’ And you’re, like, ‘It’s not good enough.’ I don’t even know how to approach this, man.”
Last October, Crahan confirmed that SLIPKNOT had been using some of the downtime during the coronavirus crisis to work on new material.
SLIPKNOT‘s latest album, “We Are Not Your Kind”, came out in August 2019. The disc sold 118,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in its first week of release to land at position No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. Furthermore, the album made an impact worldwide with No. 1 debuts in the United Kingdom, Mexico, Australia, Canada, Japan, Ireland, Belgium, Portugal and Finland, as well as Top 5 debuts in Germany, France, Norway, Italy, Austria, Sweden, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Poland, Spain and New Zealand.
“We Are Not Your Kind”‘s sales in the U.S. were boosted by a concert ticket/album sale redemption offer with SLIPKNOT‘s summer 2019 tour.
In early 2020, Crahan said that a set of 11 previously unreleased songs recorded by four members of SLIPKNOT during the sessions for its 2008 LP “All Hope Is Gone” will arrive at some point during the “We Are Not Your Kind” touring cycle.
Crahan revealed the existence of the music in 2018, saying that he, singer Corey Taylor, guitarist Jim Root and DJ Sid Wilson wrote and laid down the more psychedelic-flavored tunes at a separate studio during an impasse in the recording of “All Hope Is Gone”.
