Slipknot's Joey Jordison on How He First Learned of Paul Gray's Death | Revolver

Slipknot's Joey Jordison on How He First Learned of Paul Gray's Death

"I went berserk. I kind of went into shock."
joey Jordison 2011

In 2011, we interviewed all the members of Slipknot — minus sampler and keyboardist Craig Jones, who, as then-drummer Joey Jordison told us, "doesn't talk" — for a special collector's issue of the magazine dedicated to the Iowan masked metal juggernaut. We spoke to Jordison about the 'Knot's history, the passing of his longtime friend, bandmate and songwriting partner Paul Gray, and looked ahead to the group's future. In the exclusive outtake below, the drummer, who split with Slipknot in 2013, relays the harrowing story of how he first learned about Gray's death.

"I was on a plane [back home to Iowa], and I landed, and my phone had, like, 80 messages on it. And my phone rang and it was my manager, Cory [Brennan], and he told me, and, man, I went berserk. I kind of went into shock. I was like, 'Why are you telling me this now?!' Cory is like, 'I'm telling you this, Joey ... Calm down ..." I'm sitting next to this girl, this girl is freaking out, and I'm, like, thinking of going to jail because I'm starting to flip. Well, I smashed my phone, like, on the plane in front of everybody and, like, they do have police kind of coming after me. I'm like, 'Why are you telling me this?!' He's like, 'Well, because once you get off that tarmac, people will be saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry." Because here [in Iowa] we're almost bigger than our governor ... well, actually we probably are. So, yeah, it was pretty crazy. I lost my best friend, you know. We lost a musical soul mate."