SLIPKNOT's COREY TAYLOR: 'My Core Message Is All About Freedom'

David Dempsey conducted an interview with SLIPKNOT frontman Corey Taylor at this year's edition of the Nova Rock festival, which was held June 12-14 on the Pannonia Fields in Burgenland, the easternmost federal state of Austria (near Nickelsdorf and the Hungarian and Slovak borders). You can now listen to the chat using the SoundCloud widget below. A couple of excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On what the core message is that he is trying to convey with the various projects that he is involved in:

Taylor: "I think that my core message — and I can't speak for everybody else in the band, but, for me, being a lyricist and whatnot, I kind of have to be the voice — my core message, it's all about freedom. And whether that's art, expression or emotion… everything. For me, being able to be in this band and being able to make the music that I've made has allowed me to become more true to who I am because of the freedom that it affords me. And whether that is freedom to express a certain type of anger, or to use that anger to express a certain type of positive image, it's gotta be about freedom first, you know?! I know a lot of people get caught up in the clichés that they have in their head about what we are and what we do and what we say, but if you ask any SLIPKNOT fan — like, a trueSLIPKNOT fan — what our message is, they will tell you, absolutely it's about freedom. It's about helping each other, it's about pulling us all together and giving us a voice that maybe they don't have in their regular lives. And that allows them to get a little closer to that strength. So, for me, it's gotta start with freedom. Now, after that, it gets different, it gets choppy. There are times when I'm very dark, there are times when I'm very positive. But at the same time, the core message has always been about: express yourself, don't have that fear, let go of that fear. They may use it against you. They may prop you up and hold you up and show you as an example, but as long as you're free to be yourself, everything else after that is garbage, you know?!"

On whether he thinks he would have been able to find that freedom if he hadn't ended up in SLIPKNOT:

Taylor: "It's an interesting question. I know I still would have been writing songs and whatnot. I don't know if I would have tapped into that inner rage, which had been sitting with me for a long time. You know, I grew up very poor. I was the poor kid, I was the kid that got picked on. It didn't matter what I tried to do, I always kind of felt the brunt of that anger. So, for me, I had a lot of reservoirs of rage sitting inside of me. And when I was doing STONE SOUR, before I did SLIPKNOT, I hinted at it a little bit, because it was the first time I was able to really embrace something that was good for me. I was a good songwriter, I was a good singer, a good frontman, so I knew that I had that in me. It wasn't until I joined SLIPKNOT, though, that I was able to really, kind of, unhinge everything and let go of all the tired messages that I felt… They were already out there, and I was chasing that tail and I needed to find my message. So, I guess, without SLIPKNOT, maybe I wouldn't have been able to, kind of, let it go. I, maybe, would have gotten there eventually, but I wouldn't have gotten there as quickly. And, to be honest, because of this band, I've been able to, kind of, reassert myself and find myself a lot quicker than I might have if it was justSTONE SOUR or just the acoustic stuff that I do. I wouldn't be as solid as I am today if it wasn't for this band."

SLIPKNOT's latest album, ".5: The Gray Chapter", was released in October 2014 following a six-year hiatus during which the band's founding bassist Paul Gray died and original drummer Joey Jordison was dismissed.

SLIPKNOT's "Summer's Last Stand" tour kicks off on July 2 in West Palm Beach, Florida, wrapping up six weeks later on September 5 in Dallas.