SLIPKNOT's COREY TAYLOR Defends Smacking Phone Out Of Fan's Hands

In a brand new interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, SLIPKNOT frontman Corey Taylor talked about the controversial situation he was recently involved in where he smacked the cell phone out of someone's hands at a show. Asked for his personal take on the connectivity/disconnectivity of cell phone usage, Taylor responded: "You watch people walk down the street, and they can't get their beaks out of their stupid phones to cross the street.

"I love watching people get buried in their tiny little technological worlds, and then reality comes and smacks them in the face.

"I don't mind people who take pictures. I don't even mind people who shoot video. I love that, because you're still engaged in the show.

"A lot of people get the wrong idea; they think that if I just see someone on their phone, I'm trying to rage quit their fun. I'm not trying to do that at all. But if I see someone, and it's so obvious they're not even there, you've got to poke them with a stick to get their attention sometimes. Sometimes that means smacking the phone out of their hands.

"You can hate me all you want. It's not going to stop me from smacking those things out of people's hands."

Taylor recently had another fan thrown out of one of the band's concerts, this time on August 13 at the Concord Pavilion in Concord, California. For reasons that are unclear, Taylor apparently took issue with one particular member of the audience, having him personally ejected from the venue. In a video clip posted online, Taylor can be seen pointing to the fan in a moshpit and ordering security to "get him the fuck out!"

One Reddit user said that security had to wrestle the fan in question out of the crowd, while others at the show were unable to determine why Taylor had the person ejected.

Taylor made headlines last month for having a concertgoer removed from the band's gig in Toronto. Fan-filmed video footage showed Taylor pointing at someone in the crowd and saying into the mic, "You don't show me shit, you little pussy." Within 15 seconds, security escorted the person out, with Taylor waving and saying, "Bye bye, bitch."

Fans on Reddit claimed the fan was hurling insults at Corey and flipping him off, while another wrote that the man was attacking people in the crowd for no reason. Taylor himself later explained to a New York radio station that the person was "showing some serious disrespect."

In a separate incident earlier this summer, Taylor smacked the phone out of the hand of a texting fan during a SLIPKNOT concert. The singer later explained his action by tweeting, "If you're gonna text, stay home."

Taylor told The Pulse Of Radio that he stands by his response to the fan texting in the front row. "Go to a show to see a show," he said. "You wanna text, stay home. You wanna find an excuse to text? Get out of the barricade! Let somebody else get up there! Don't abuse it, because there are people who would push you down by your face to get there. Stop trying to find ways to get around it. Just shut up!"

SLIPKNOT's current North American tour continues Thursday night (August 25) in Dallas, Texas.