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SLIPKNOT Bassist Comments On Michigan Fan's Concert Death

January 20, 2005

SLIPKNOT bassist Paul Gray recently spoke to TheAge.com.au about the group's lyrics and their fanatical fan base the world over, among other topics. Several excerpts from the interview follow:

On whether the subliminal value of SLIPKNOT's art seems largely about inviting mass catharsis through the acknowledgment of mutual unhappiness:

"I guess you could say that sometimes, but you know what? It's also taking power from that. It's not a bleak, dismal outcome kinda thing, dude. It's like taking from all this negative and making it positive.

"I don't think the world is a bright place; I think there are bright places in the world that you need to find. That's not where we're coming from, sure, but that's where we're going to. That's where everyone is going to.

"When people come to our show, they don't leave negative, like going to go fight somebody. They leave thrilled, like, 'God, that was an awesome show and I got all my aggression out in the pit and I might go home and . . . be stoked!' "

On whether he has ever had cause to fear for the personal health of members of the SLIPKNOT audience — "maggots", they're affectionately called — while they're getting all their aggression out in the pit:

"Uuuuh, yeah. There's been a couple of times dudes have gotten pretty hurt at our shows. Nothing really to do with anything except for being overcrowded.

"We had a girl in Detroit, she died because she had some seizure or something, and it was so packed they couldn't get anybody to her. We didn't even know until we got offstage. We walked outside and saw this little girl. Sometimes you think about stuff like that. But then you find out there was nothing you could do. Even her parents said that.

"When we're playing, we're kinda goin' off, so I don't really notice what's goin' on. I mean, I can see, like, little flash pictures, like stills of the crowd or whatever, because I'm headbanging most of the time. The visibility inside that mask is not that good."

Read the entire interview at this location.

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