Slipknot played a concert for the first time in 18 months on Saturday night (September 4th), performing a headlining set at the Rocklahoma festival. For the band’s long-awaited return to the stage, singer Corey Taylor sported a creepy new mask.
Taylor is coming off a recent bout with COVID-19, having contracted the virus at the end of his summer solo tour. After a rough battle in which he said “it’s the worst I’ve ever been sick in my life,” he thankfully reported that he tested negative about 10 days ago, giving him the all-clear to tour with Slipknot. The singer believed he likely caught COVID from a “selfish” concertgoer.
For Slipknot’s show at Rocklahoma, Taylor rocked a skeletal mask with beady eyes and Chelsea-smile stitching around the mouth. The change comes in the middle of the band’s touring cycle for 2019’s We Are Not Your Kind, and, in this writer’s humble opinion, marks a vast improvement over the flat-looking mask he sported pre-pandemic.
A few months ago, Taylor gave some insight into the new mask in an interview with radio station Lazer 103.3, saying, “I can tell you that the mask I’m working on is very disturbing. It’s gonna be hard to look at. And it’ll probably be my favorite mask that I’ve ever put together. It’s little bits and pieces of things that have intrigued me, of masks that I’ve had in the past. And it’s gonna have a devil-may-care kind of terror to it, let’s put it that way.”
For the 14-song set, the other members of Slipknot sported the same We Are Not Your Kind masks that they wore before the pandemic shut down the concert industry. The Rocklahoma set also marked the band’s first show since the passing of former drummer Joey Jordison earlier this summer.
Slipknot will next play three festivals in a row (Inkcarceration, Riot Fest, and Knotfest Iowa) before kicking off their headlining “Knotfest Roadshow” tour on September 28th. Pick up tickets via Ticketmaster.
See social media pics and video footage of Corey Taylor performing in his new mask below, followed by the setlist and our recent video interview with the Slipknot singer.
Corey’s newest mask debuts at Rocklahoma @slipknot pic.twitter.com/aYx4u0GgoB
— Rocklahoma (@Rocklahoma) September 5, 2021
Slipknot Rocklahoma 2021 Setlist:
Unsainted
Disasterpiece
Nero Forte
Before I Forget
Psychosocial
Wait and Bleed
Vermilion
Eyeless
Left Behind
All Out Life
Duality
People = Shit
(sic)
Surfacing
