KORN Frontman Discusses His DJ Alter Ego J DEVIL (Video)

KORN frontman Jonathan Davis recently spoke to ARTISTdirect about his DJ alter ego J Devil. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

ARTISTdirect: How was J Devil born?

Davis: J Devil just came to me. I was making music, and I was trying to think of a name for myself. It just popped into my head. It's my initials "JD" and then "Evil". My wife's nickname is "Devil". I've been fascinated with the devil my whole life so it slipped in organically. It's like KORN and everything else I've ever done musically, in that respect.

ARTISTdirect: How do songs start?

Davis: There aren't that many lyrics here. I'm going to do some though. It starts with an idea. I just start with a beat, a bass patch I made, or anything like that, and I build on it. It's intricate, tedious, and difficult work. People think electronic music is really easy. A lot of people are like, "Oh, I wish I could do that" or whatever. It's really hard though. Doing KORN songs is easy to me. I can do a KORN song in an hour. That song I just played you took two weeks to make. It's all intense programming, and it's pretty difficult.

ARTISTdirect: Has J Devil always been in the back of your mind? Did you know if you were going to do EDM, you were going to take it to an evil place?

Davis: Yeah, it started off as dark. I made KORN dark. I'm inspired by dark things, and I wanted to create this alter ego that was different from KORN. EDM is so much different in general. I wanted to basically incorporate all of the kinds of EDM music that I like into this. I have song called "Move" that's basically dubstep, jungle, and drum 'n' bass all in one. I like mixing genres together. I have some songs that are straight metal. I don't know what the fuck it is. It's just different. Everybody I play it for just freaks out because it is so different. It's all still in the electro vain because I'm an electro freak. I love that 130, 128 BPM. I love the four-on-the-floor pattern, but I change it up.

ARTISTdirect: Is it important for you to create visuals with the songs?

Davis: Yeah, it's about creating a vibe or a landscape but incorporating those evil, dark things in our lives and putting them to music you can dance to and get your aggressions out to. At the same time, you can just dance, have a good time, wild out, and have fun. That's one of the main things I like about the EDM scene. Everybody's so nice. There's no jealousy or competition. All of the DJs get up together. It's like a family or a brotherhood. I want to come in there, shake things up, and be the antichrist of that scene.

Read the entire interview from ARTISTdirect.