New Slipknot is incoming. In a new interview with Knotfest, frontman Corey Taylor and percussionist Shawn "Clown" Crahan announced that their band are about to release a single tomorrow (November 5th) called "The Chapeltown Rag," which they will also be debuting live that evening at their show in L.A.
Inspired by a Netflix documentary Taylor watched, the song is about the Yorkshire Ripper serial killer who murdered multiple women in the Leeds, England, suburb of Chapeltown in the late 1970s. The case was famously bungled by investigators who initially believed the culprit was specifically targeting prostitutes, and Taylor says he was moved by dark, violent moral failings of that time in history — which he sees being echoed in our current age of social media pervasiveness.
"It's a punisher, man," Taylor said of the song, which earned its title from a made-up newspaper that would be filled with the gruesome happenings of a town wracked by violence.
"It's classic Slipknot," the frontman continued. "And it's frenetic. But lyrically, it's coming from a point of talking about the various manipulations that can happen when social media meets media itself. And the different ways that these manipulations can try to pull us in different directions, in the fact that we're all becoming addicts to it, which is very, very dangerous."
According to Knotfest, the song's chorus sees Taylor experimenting with a new vocal approach that he's never used in Slipknot before.
"I wasn't even sure if that part was going to be the chorus, to be honest," Taylor explained. "But I just love the way that the chord progression lent itself this weird, chromatic, minor vibe to it, which I had never really done before.
"I played with it on 'Vermilion' years ago," he continued. "But I had never really given it a little more aggression. The harmony that I created for it was just so fucking weird as well that it just gives it that slight dissonant vibe, but it's also very, very melodic and hummable."
Although the chorus seems to be one of the most unique musical aspects of the track, Taylor also glowed about how pulverizing the "big breakdown" at the end is, which is good news for old-school 'Knot fans.
"The big breakdown at the end where it just fucking goes off the rails is is so heavy, dude," he quipped.
Later on in the interview, Taylor offered up some thoughts on how he's been dealing with the death of founding Slipknot drummer Joey Jordison, who died earlier this year at age 46.
"It's been tough,'"Taylor said. "You know, with Joey there was so much. . .you know, he was such a complicated guy. Probably one of the most talented people I've ever met. Maybe one of the most tortured. When I think about the good things, the tough things get in, and it's still taking me time to process."
He continued, "But the things I do remember, there were so many good times, so many great fucking shows with him and just so many good memories of creating music with him. That's the stuff that I'm really trying to focus on."
Lastly, he opened up about where the band's headspace is at right now coming off of the year-and-a-half-long break from touring, and some serious studio time working on a new album that Crahan has now referred to multiple times as "God music."
"It's actually really cool, to be honest," Taylor said of the band's attitude. "We're in such a great headspace lately. And again, I don't know if it's because we felt like we were taking everything for granted. And getting it back has made us come together even stronger as a band, or whatever. But we're all getting along so well."
"It feels like it did when we first started touring," he added. "When we first started touring, we were really tight and we all did everything together. Then obviously, as time went on, our personalities got bigger and our addictions got bigger. We all pulled apart in a lot of different ways and it was hard to get back to that. But now, it almost feels like it's come full circle."
