Slipknot Bassist Gives Insight Into Working with Ross Robinson

1999's 'Slipknot' album transformed Paul Gray from Iowa metalhead into full-fledged rock star. The Slipknot bassist has spent the last decade in a dizzying schedule of writing, recording and touring but it was that first Roadrunner Records release that sparked the fire. Even Ross Robinson's (Korn, Machine Head) unorthodox producing style garnered a lot of press at the time. The word was that he acted more like the drill sergeant in 'Full Metal Jacket' than he did "rock 'n' roll producer guy' when he worked with Slipknot.

With the 10th anniversary of 'Slipknot' upon us, the band has just reissued it in a special edition box set which features a ton of extra content from the band including songs that were cut off the record for controversial reasons. Noisecreep spoke with Gray about working with Robinson and the folks at Roadrunner Records.

The Ross Robinson legend started around the time of the self-titled Slipknot album. Was he as tough on you guys as it was made out in the media?

He was on fire dude! When we first met him, I just remember his intensity. His vibe was perfect for our music and we needed someone like him to get everything focused. But look, it wasn't like he was yelling at us or anything. He was fired up and all of that but we loved that about him. If you listen closely to certain songs, you can actually hear him screaming in the background. I can hear it pretty easily but then again, I know the songs inside out. That's how passionate he was when we were tracking everything. I remember his face and how much his energy got us going. We'd never experienced anything like that before but he was never hard on us.

Do you remember how Monte Conner (the band's A&R person) reacted to the album when he first heard it?

Yeah and he loved it. Roadrunner Records has always been such an important label in heavy metal and we respected that. Monte has signed so many bands that we loved and grew up on. His opinion meant a lot to us so his reaction meant a lot. He definitely has his opinions on what we do but so does Slipknot. We have a mutual respect for each other and have never had a problem with him.



Did Monte make you guys change anything significant on the self-titled album?

Not really anything that we were uncomfortable with. We had different versions of 'Spit it Out' and that was a Monte thing. He had preferred the demo of the song so we tried to recreate it in the studio but you know how it is. It's never as good as the demo (laughter). When it comes down to it, I don't even know which version of that song ended up on the final version!

When you listen to the album now, are there things that bother you about it?

I actually love the album. With the reissue being released, I think we finally have a version of the album that is complete since the song 'Purity' had been taken off. We were getting sued because of that track.



What happened?

We had read a story about a girl named Purity Knight who was kidnapped and buried alive in a box. People should look up the story and see for themselves. There was something so f*cking creepy about that story and it inspired the song. Anyway, we were being threatened with a lawsuit by the person who wrote the article. We had found the article on some website and we thought it was a true story. Either way, it's still really scary stuff.