US Radio Update: Without being officially released to radio, “BOTHER” has also become the #1 requested song in both Detroit and Philidelphia, beating out EMINEM’s “Without Me” by a 2-1 vote. It should also be noted that Des Moines’ LAZER 1033 (KAZR), was among the first to add “BOTHER” to its play lists. Nice. Many a first-time happening this weekend in Des Moines, IOWA. Where to start…ah, yes – Stone Sour (featuring Corey Taylor and Jim Root of Slipknot) and downthesun will be playing their first ever show together (see end of update for show details)…in fact, it is the first show for either band while on Roadrunner Records. …this will be Stone Sour’s first time playing live under the name Stone Sour in this here the new millennium (first show played under the name Stone Sour since 1997, to be exact)…the band has been practicing for this weekend’s show in the basement of Corey’s home – back when Stone Sour first formed in 1992, they first used to practice in the basement of Corey’s grandmother’s house, back when Corey used to work at the Adult Emporium on 14th Street (Corey’s first job? Don’t know)…Rock… …for downthesun, this will be the first time a live show of their’s will be videotaped (Slipknot’s Clown is directing the effort)…that videotape will most likely serve as the first time YOU get to see live footage of the band, as this footage could very well be used as an early video for one of their songs…this will be the first and last time you will ever get the opportunity to buy a certain downthesun t-shirt (the band printed up 84 shirts of a design for this show, one time only, never to be printed again)…Roll… show details: Sunday, June 23rd Toad Hollar 1820 East Army Post Rd. Des Moines IA, 50320 doors at 6:00pm 1st Band at 8:00pm (Index Case and On A Pale Horse also appear) another first: this will be the first time for either band hitting the stage at Toad Hollar – neither has ever played there before. famous parting words: “If you’re not there, I feel very, very, sorry for you” – Corey Taylor, 06.21.2002 Corey Is Bothered… In stores now is the soundtrack to the motion picture Spider-Man. In case you don’t already know, there is a song on the soundtrack titled “Bother”. “Bother”, as written and performed by Slipknot’s Corey Taylor. How did this come to be? What is the song all about? What does the song sound like? Interview with Corey Taylor: “Bother”, Spider-Man, and more (May 9th, 2002): Roadrunner: Have you seen the movie Spider-Man yet? Corey : I haven’t had a chance to yet, man. I’m freakin’ out, I’ve been waiting for this movie to come out since ’93 when James Cameron was going to direct it. The movie I’ve been waiting for most of my life hits, and I’m in the studio workingí¢ä‰åŒ_but I’m probably going to see it tonight. Roadrunner: Very cool, what are you in the studio working on right now? Corey: Well, I’m working on my side project that was entitled Superego, but now I think we’re gonna call it Closure. Roadrunner : I was going to ask you a bit about your side project. How many people are involved in it? You andí¢ä‰åŒ_ Corey : Jim from Slipknot is in it. Two of the guys from Stone Sour, the band I was in before Slipknot. Actually, Jim was in Stone Sour as well. And a friend of mine who I’ve been working with for like 13 years plays guitar. Roadrunner: How many songs do you guys have down? Corey: We have 16 songs, including “Bother”. Roadrunner: So, “Bother”, the recording and writing, that was purely you, right? Corey: Yeah. Roadrunner: “Biggest Spider-Man freak of all time”, you have been quoted as saying. When did this all start? What is the attraction? Corey : It started when I was a kid – my mom actually kept a lot of comic books around. She just kind of had them stacked all over the place. As a kid, we were really poor so I didn’t have a lot to read, but I was an avid reader. So I’d start picking up these comic books and reading them. I discovered Spider-Man and just fell in love with the character. Everybody likes to talk about his sense of responsibility, and that he’s cursed with these powersí¢ä‰åŒ_what I liked was that he would just talk shit the whole time he was fighting the enemies. He didn’t take any of it seriously – he’s staring into the face of danger and he’s just like ‘Guess what? If it’s gonna happen it’s gonna happen, I’m gonna win, and that’s just the way it goes.’ I really looked up to that, ya know? Roadrunner: “Bother”, this was written what, seven years ago you’ve said? Corey: Yeah, about seven years ago. I wrote it on the dashboard of my friend’s car as I was moving back from Denver, back to Des Moines. I wrote the lyrics in about six minutes. When I finally got home I grabbed the guitar because I didn’t want to lose it, and I worked the music out. It was basically just something that I would play once in a while just for myself. And then when I was doing the demos for this side project, I went in and recorded it – just on a whim, real quick, real barebones, me and a guitar. It fell into the hands of Denise Louiso at Sony. She heard it, she flipped outí¢ä‰åŒ_it just kind of went from there. Roadrunner: What’s the song about? Corey: The song is just about the time I was moving back from Denver – I just felt really broken down because I moved to Denver to try to move forward with my music. I just got to the point where it was like ‘nothing is going to happen for me in Des Moines.’ Ya know, how ironic is that? I moved out to Denver and found out it was the same way all over the place. It was actually worse in Denver because at the time nobody gave a shit about original music, it was all cover bands out there. I was so used to being able to do what I wanted in Des Moines. I actually fractured my arm at a party and I lost my job out there so I was literally living off bottles and cans. It got to the point where I had to move back, just no way it was working for me out there. So I move back to Des Moines and that song, I had been toying with the idea of that song for a while. And I just hit the dash lights and wrote it down in like 5-6 minutes, and I just kept humming it the whole way home. Roadrunner: Obviously, you had no end use in mind for this song at the time, correct? Corey: No, no, not at all, man. Ya know, I have forty or fifty songs just like that, all acoustic. I write that stuff for me. It was just one of those songs where if I never get to do anything with it, at least I have a recording of it. So it just turned into that, and through the grace of God it ended up in somebody’s hands. It’s funny how fate works. Roadrunner: The whole Spider-Man soundtrack, did you actually pursue that or did it just happen? Corey: You know what, I’d been telling my ex-manager to get me on the soundtrack for a year. As soon as I found out it was happening, I was like ‘look, I don’t care what you do, I don’t care what you say, you need to get me on that soundtrackí¢ä‰åŒ_’ Roadrunner: You wanted that song on it in particular. Corey: Oh, absolutely. If there was any song that was going to be on there, it was going to be that one. Roadrunner: And why was it “Bother” over any of the other 40 songs you have written acoustically? Corey: Just for the fact that if you read the lyrics, it’s all about following your path in life even though you know it’s not the path that you want, and it’s not the path you really have in mind. And it kind of fits along with the whole Spider-Man theme, ya know? If you look at his powers, it’s a blessing and a curse – he’s cursed to fulfill his own destiny because of this, and yes he gets to help people and what not, but at the same time he has to live with all this stuff going on in his life and really deal with the downside of everything. So the lyrics, the feel of it really fit in with what is going on in the movie, I believe. Roadrunner: Very well put, very well put. Couple more questions. The side project, how often you guys playing right now? Corey: Actually, we just got done recording the album. We’re just trying to get it mixed and mastered and all that stuff. Roadrunner: You recorded all sixteen songs? Corey: Yeah. Roadrunner: What do people have to look forward to hearing, sound wise? Corey: It’s really good – It’s real melodic, it’s more hard rock, but it’s still heavy, by all meansí¢ä‰åŒ_.it’s really heavy. But at the same time it’s nowhere near as heavy as Slipknot is. This is more of like Metallica meets Alice In Chains. It’s really good stuff and I hope people dig it. Roadrunner: As for Slipknot, dvd is in the works right now, and you’ll be playing some upcoming shows in Europe, so festivalsí¢ä‰åŒ_ Corey: Yeah, some festivals in Augustí¢ä‰åŒ_ Roadrunner: Other future Slipknot plans in the works right now? Corey: We (Slipknot) are gonna get together next year and start working on a new album. For right now, this side project is pretty much my only priority. Roadrunner: You see this project touring this year. Corey: Yeah, absolutely. Should be doing America this year. We thank Corey for his time. Stone Sour… more info coming soon….