KORN INTERVIEW DURING FAMILY VALUES TOUR

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KORN INTERVIEW DURING FAMILY VALUES TOUR

OPERATOR: Okay, ladies and gentlemen at this time the floor has been opened for questions. If you would like to ask a question please press the star key followed by the one key on your touch tone phone now. Again that’s star followed by one on your touch tone phone now. Okay Miss Esslin, just a moment.

 

MALE SPEAKER: This is a trip.

 

FEMALE SPEAKER: It takes time.

 

MALE SPEAKER: The future is now. The future is now for sure.

 

OPERATOR: Okay again ladies and gentlemen, please press star followed by one on your touch tone phone to ask a question. Okay, first we have Gary Graff with the Oakland Press. Please go ahead.

 

GARY GRAFF: Hey guys, how you doing?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNKY: Good, good, great.

 

GARY GRAFF: Welcome and welcome to The Future is Now; a question first about the album. What was the kind of creative mission you felt on it and what was the impact of doing this after doing the Unplugged session, what kind of impact did that have on it? And also would you mind saying who’s who you know at least at the beginning.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Go for it Munky.

 

MUNKY: I missed the question, I’m sorry.

 

GARY GRAFF: Just wondering about the creative mission you felt for the album and what impact doing it after the Unplugged session had.

 

MUNKY: Well, and this is Munky. I thought the Unplugged album was going to have, honestly, more of an impact on the new album. But I think since we had rehearsed so much for the whole, the whole, the whole show I think we were ready to kind of get away from that for a minute. But I don’t know. I think also I think the involvement with The Cure sort of had an influence and it inspired me personally because I really wasn’t a big Cure fan until, you know, they joined us for that song and I think that had an impact that sort of a Gothicy sort of a feel in my guitar playing.

 

GARY GRAFF: All right, Jonathan you’re kind of sense of what you guys wanted to do on this album?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: You know when we get together and do albums it’s not nothing that we really want to do. It’s a purely organic thing. We start writing riffs and build things around it. I know from the beginning a thing we did different was we included our twin keyboard, Zac Baird came in and he wrote, you know, with us and he did some amazing melodies and some really tasteful stuff. He didn’t go too overboard with what we were trying to do. And also having Terry Bozzio come in and play drums with us, I mean that pushed us in different directions we never thought we’d go. We got kind of progressive with some of the songs and you know, it was a really cool experience. Munky really stepped up and did a lot, a lot of work and spent a lot of time with Atticus coming up with amazing guitar sounds, sounds that we’d never really heard and the whole process was super experimental and that’s you know, we really enjoy doing stuff like that being creative and being artists. So, I guess that’s how it ended up.

 

GARY GRAFF: What was the, sorry how did you go from The Matrix to Atticus on this album?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: We went, we wrote with both. We had The Matrix and we did like you know, I think there was like 12 ideas that we did with them and then we came and had Atticus and we started to. We started working with Atticus and we were working with The Matrix at the same time and we really enjoyed the songs that we did with The Matrix and they’re great and everything, but the stuff we were doing with Atticus was more organic and you know it was stuff that we could play live. It was done as a band and therefore we decided to choose, you know, our four favorite songs from The Matrix and record them with live drums and just stuff like that. And it was purely a production thing, it wasn’t anything against them. They’re great we love working with them but, the vibe and the (inaudible), the overall sound what we were looking for we like with Atticus and so we went in that direction.

 

GARY GRAFF: Okay very good thanks. There’s a lot of folks on the call so bye.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions Mr. Graff. Our next question comes from Katherine Turner, excuse me, Turman of Bio Writer. Please go ahead.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: Hi guys,

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNKY: Hello, hello.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: So I’ve only seen this online but I’ve seen the album cover artwork online so I was wondering what that represents, and how you know the artist Richard Kirk (sp)?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I’m a total art freak and I’ve been discovering different kinds of galleries that contain like the Darker Side of Order stuff on the tube and I went to Paul Booth (sp) tattoo shop actually, and that’s in New York and there’s a gallery that he has in his tattoo shop called the Strychnine Gallery and one of Richards pieces was up in that gallery and I purchased it and when it came time to think of art work and stuff like I showed Munk this guys art and I thought it would really be cool if he did something and the guys really dug it and we went after it, after him and he was really stoked to do this album cover. He went, the biggest reason that I liked it is because it’s the whole black and white thing and it was so intricate and so detailed. He does pointillism and all this stuff. He uses little teeny pens and the art is just amazing so we thought it would be good and the piece that he did for the cover and all the rest of them you know, represent what he feels Korn is and what he gets out of it when he hears the music. So its to get more depth than what the actual piece is about you’ve got to talk to him because he wrote me like a book about what its about.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: Wow, and I understand there were several other pieces of artwork that were done in the sessions that he did and you chose this one?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Yeah, yeah we did a total of I think six pieces and we chose the cover.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: And will that be a tattoo for you?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: No, because you cant tattoo that.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: All right.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: There’s too much detail.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: All right, another quick question and then Ill let other people get in. Songs like the song Killing. It has some really interesting bird imagery; it’s a very visual song. I was wondering what inspired that.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: That was more about, you know, I used the bird just as an example. Like a bird or any animal its like if you see a bird and its sitting on a wire and I’ve got a gun pointed at it, it sits there and it stares at you and it doesn’t fly away. You know, it’s just sitting in the cross hairs and it gets killed and I think that just goes with any kind of relationship or us as human beings in general we like to take abuse. We sit there and take it and take it and get beat on and beat on and that’s just our human nature. It’s just our trained response to do that. Anything horrible happens to us we - were preset to reset to dumb because we just look the other way or we forget about that pain. That’s the real vibe, lyrically, of that song.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: Interesting, thanks. All right Ill let someone else jump in. Thank you.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions Miss Turman. Our next question comes from John Black of Boston Now! Please go ahead.

 

JOHN BLACK: Hey guys, how are you?

 

MALE SPEAKER: What’s going on?

 

JOHN BLACK: One thing I was curious about. When I told people I was going to do this interview I got very different reactions. People know you from South Park, you’ve been quoted on the Gilmore Girls. Do you have any concept…?

 

MALE SPEAKER: Gilmore Girls?

 

JOHN BLACK: Yeah, they referred to you. Someone, their grandmother rented their house to you guys, and you were very nice. I’m just curious; do you have any idea of your impact or your influence outside of music and can you tell me about South Park how they got you to do that.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I think, I don’t know, our influence on the outside is just like it just happens and its like are you kidding me? Just like I’m (inaudible) to know about that Gilmore Girls thing.

 

MUNKY: I have no idea.

 

JOHN BLACK: It’s a pretty strange reference.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Pretty strange yeah, Ill have to remember that. Yeah it’s strange and the whole South Park thing was cool because we wanted to premiere our single at the time on the show and they asked us if we would be interested in doing the Halloween special and we were like, hell yes. It was just a fun experience. We did it twice actually. We did it once in, I don’t know what town we were.

 

MUNKY: Chicago.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Oh we were in Chicago and the ISTN was messed up or something and they didn’t record it and we had to go back to another studio and do it again.

 

MUNKY: It was a lot of fun.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: It was so much fun.

 

JOHN BLACK: Was it fun seeing it?

 

MUNKY: I spent most of the time laughing because Matt and Trez (sp) they were doing their, you know, all the characters and it was hard to be quiet and not laugh while they were doing Carmen and you know Stan and all the different characters.

 

JOHN BLACK: My other quick question is that, now you’re on the Family Values Tour and I remember when the Family Values Tour started it was really a reaction to the political scene in the country and the music scene in the country. Does it still mean that to you or is it just another tour group of a group of bands going out to play?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Munk, take it; I’ve got to run for a second.

 

MUNKY: I’m sorry what was the question?

 

JOHN BLACK: Well I was just when Family Values Tour started it was kind of a reaction to the political scene at the time and the music scene at the time and now it just feels like its just another tour. Do you think it still holds that impact politically and musically?

 

MUNKY: I think that it’s definitely changed. Originally our original idea was to have something that was you know, something continuous for the fans, you know. And I still think it has an impact on the fans.

 

JOHN BLACK: In what way; any ideas.

 

MUNKY: Like it, you know I think there’s still something for everybody to do. If there’s you know a lot of bands that they don’t like on the bill. This year we’ve added a second stage and we want to keep it, keep the fun all day. You know we don’t want it to be about okay you’re going to go see these bands and then the day is over.

 

JOHN BLACK: Right.

 

MUNKY: We want it to be fun all day long.

 

JOHN BLACK: Excellent. That’s it for me guys Ill pass it on to someone else.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions Mr. Black. Our next question comes from Ann Ryan of Connections Magazine. Ma’am, please go ahead.

 

ANN RYAN: Hi Munky, Hi Jonathan if you’re back. The touring line up in Korn has obviously changed quite a bit since the bands origin and I’m wondering how that change, how that’s changed the dynamic of the live show and specifically how its been playing with Joey and Clint.

 

MUNKY: They’re great musicians. I mean two of the most talented musicians I’ve ever played with. And it’s different; it’s a bit more heavy a bit more metal. In the earlier songs it’s taken on a sort of a different life. I think it’s definitely you know, were playing our songs, but there’s just a few more things on it. You know we have a touring keyboardist as well, so you know he’s kind of added some things to some old songs and made them more interesting to play. But it’s a bummer to lose your friends along with the dream that you had when you were kids. But it’s made the three of us, well, stronger I think.

 

ANN RYAN: Does David plan on rejoining the band down the road or?

 

MUNKY: I hope so, I really hope so.

 

ANN RYAN: Your music has definitely changed as you just touched on over the years. It seems like maybe it’s not quite as dark as it once was. Is that something you’ve been working towards? Or is that just a natural progression, a maturing process?

 

MUNKY: I think really, you know, each album is just a reflection of where you are creatively and where you are at that point in your life. And collectively where each of us are and what were going to bring, you know, what sort of guitar riffs and music I’m going to bring and what sort of lyrics Jonathan is going to bring. I think it’s just a reflection of where you are creatively at that time. And I think, you know, when I look back at all the records that we’ve done, it’s definitely evolved into something more musical.

 

ANN RYAN: Fair enough. One more question for you actually. Two of the bands on your label are touring on Family Values Tour. Can you tell us a little about them and how they ended up on the tour and on your label?

 

MUNKY: Well, there’s one band called Monster in the Machine that’s actually not on the tour, but they’ll be touring in the fall on their own tour. But the other band is the metal band called Droid. And they are friends of mine and they’ve been playing in Long Beach and around the LA area for about ten years and I put this label together called Emotional Sites and Recordings and they were my first act and you know, it was cool because I had Jonathan and (inaudible) support and our managements support to put them on the bill, which was huge because to be on a big tour like that these days its really hard to do, especially being a baby band but like the old saying goes its all who you know.

 

ANN RYAN: Big break for them.

 

MUNKY: Especially in this business.

 

ANN RYAN: Thank you very much. Ill let someone else take the floor now.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions Miss Ryan. Our next question comes from Jamie Steinberg of Starry Constellation Magazine. Please go ahead.

 

JAMIE STEINBERG: Hey Munky, thanks for talking to us.

 

MUNKY: Hey, how you doing?

 

JAMIE STEINBERG: Good, what made you guys want to return to doing the Family Values Tour?

 

MUNKY: It was really successful last year. I mean when we first started it, you know, it went for two or three years and then it kind of got away from what we originally wanted to do which you know, again, keep the crowd involved in having a lot of things to do. It kind of got away from that. We let it, we didn’t do it for a few years so, we decided to bring it back and we were able to make it more of a festival style tour and bring it outdoors. And it was successful last year, you know, so we decided to do it again.

 

JAMIE STEINBERG: What can concert goers expect from a Korn performance on Family Values?

 

MUNKY: High energy were doing a lot of songs that we haven’t played in probably, some songs we haven’t played in eight or nine years. Were kind of going deep into album tracks and were not just doing all of our, all the singles, were really going into songs that fans haven’t heard for a long time. I think they’re going to be really excited.

 

JAMIE STEINBERG: In 2006 you mentioned in an interview that you’re working on a solo album. When can fans expect it?

 

MUNKY: They can expect it next year.

 

JAMIE STEINBERG: What made you guys pick Evolution as the first single on your new album?

 

MUNKY: It kind of represents, it has a lot of the elements that the album contains I think, it just kind of represents, it’s a good representation of the album.

 

JAMIE STEINBERG: Thanks for talking to us.

 

MUNKY: All right thank you.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions Ms. Steinberg. Our next question comes from Roxie Maisel with Hard Drive. Please go ahead.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Roxie Maisel, what’s up with that? Hey dudes.

 

MUNKY: What’s up?

 

ROXIE MAISEL: How you been?

 

MUNKY: Busy.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: I know, and Ill see you tomorrow. Okay listen lets talk about the album. I’ve heard it, its killer. I’d like you to talk about a couple of songs and what, is Jonathan around?

 

MUNKY: He was.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Is he coming back?

 

MUNKY: I hope.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: All right, well I was going to try and see if you guys had a sense of what y’all think might be the next single? If you had your druthers, what do you think it might be?

 

MUNKY: There’s a song that were, called Hold On and there was another one called Innocent Bystander, then there was another one called Starting Over and these are the ones that were kind of looking at. What do you want to hear?

 

ROXIE MAISEL: I’m guessing, I think Starting Over should be the next one. I don’t know, what do you think? Is Starting Over a catchy tune, kids will like it on the radio?

 

MUNKY: I think it’s a good tune.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Now let me see, what else do I want to talk to about here…

 

MUNKY: You want to talk to me about the guy in Atlanta, the football player?

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Dude what is up with that?

 

MUNKY: Fuckin’ crazy.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: I know.

 

MUNKY: Oh hey I forgot there’s a bunch of other people….

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Yeah there’s a bunch of other people we can’t sit here and yak. Lets talk about the - okay here’s one for you. Do you think it’s kind of ironic that Head puts out this book that’s coming out right before the tour, which kind of…?

 

MUNKY: What tour, our tour?

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Yeah, I don’t know, is it kind of weird or is it lame?

 

MUNKY: I was kind of thinking that’s convenient for him, the timing yeah, kind of. I don’t know. I miss him, but.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Well you know he came by we did a long interview and….

 

MUNKY: Oh yeah, does he hate me?

 

ROXIE MAISEL: No. As a matter of fact he’s wishing everybody all the best, you know. I did ask him if he was planning on maybe going to the show in Phoenix and he said he hadn’t thought about that yet, so.

Let’s talk about the Evolution video. Is it done yet? Can you tell us about it, I haven’t seen it yet, but I know that the Devolution Evolution dot come site that is cool, so tell us a bit about the video.

 

MUNKY: The video is, you know, kind of random facts pop up about you know, how people are getting dumber, and that’s kind of what it’s about. You know, (inaudible) stuff in there. I don’t know, you have to see it.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: I think I’m going to say good-bye because you know, oh all right I think you talk about Joey and Clint on the tour.

 

MUNKY: Yeah, Joey and Clint they’re great. The band sounds really great.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Oh I know, who came up with the bands on the Family Values Tour this year? How did you guys come to some of these new bands that you’re going to be turning people on like Through You and Twin Method? There’s some pretty cool new bands on the second stage.

 

MUNKY: I don’t know. It wasn’t me. That’s all I know. I’ve got my boys Droid on the tour, that’s all I care.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: All right, well I’m going to duck out, thank you. See you Friday.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions. We have another question from Gary Graff with the Oakland Press. Please go ahead.

 

GARY GRAFF: Munky, talk about I guess doing this album you know, as the lone guitarist compared to doing the last one. I mean how much more did you know now, what did you learn from the last album that you applied this time?

 

MUNKY: I think on See You on the Other Side, I relatively bounced through those guitar tracks pretty quickly and what I learned from that was that I really wanted to take my time on recording different guitars, different guitar sounds because I really wanted to texturize this album more and have it have a lot of different guitar sounds. I think that’s probably - I definitely learned that I wanted to take more time with recording all my guitars and I did.

 

GARY GRAFF: How did you wind up drafting Jonathan to playing drums on this one?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I’m back.

 

GARY GRAFF: Jonathan, how did you get drafted to play drums on the album?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Because I’m a freak and I like playing drums I probably just pushed my way into it. No I mean honestly, there was a couple songs where we didn’t have Brooks, and Terry was gone and Atticus came in and said hey go up there and play some drums, and I went up and played the drums and they ended up making it on this album.

 

GARY GRAFF: You didn’t want to put on like head set mic for the tour and do the lead drummer thing?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: No I’m not Night Ranger.

 

GARY GRAFF: Night Ranger?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Didn’t Night Ranger have a drummer singer?

 

GARY GRAFF: What about in terms of the album, going with an untitled title.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: The untitled titles? We have one or two to name the record. You know with the other records we came up with a title and it was good, but this time it just felt like it didn’t need to have any kind of boundaries or title to it. Another reason people were like you’ve got to title the record and were like no we don’t, and we just thought it would be cool for our fans and the press would come up with a name for it, kind of like when Metallica had their Black album and there was the White album and all of the other ones. We just threw it out there.

 

GARY GRAFF: So we should start calling this (inaudible) or something.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Whatever you want to call it. (Inaudible) put out a bunch of albums, he didn’t title them.

 

GARY GRAFF: Who?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: It’s been done.

 

GARY GRAFF: In terms of this, this is the last album with the Virgin deal. What are you thinking about for the next, you know what you’re going to do after this?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Seriously were going to wait and see. We have a lot of different options and I think were just going to look back and see what we want to do. Right now were just concentrating on touring on this record and doing that and when the time comes to make another record we’ll start figuring out what were going to do.

 

GARY GRAFF: Were you happy with the way this went? Do you feel like you’ve created a model that you can move forward with?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I think it worked out great for us. Yeah. We basically did this deal to, it was kind of an incentive for record labels and the promoters and everyone involved with the partners to do their job because if they did their job and pushed the record and did what they were supposed to do it would make more money on the back end of us touring and the merchandise and stuff like that. So, it definitely helped us.

 

GARY GRAFF: All right good. Well thanks, Ill add something else later depending on how the call goes.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you. This question comes from Katherine Turman, Bio Writer. Please go ahead.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: Hi, guys. I heard that the record was written in a fairly short period of time, about one month. I was wondering if there was one song that started things out that set the tone for the writing and how do you know when a record is done? Could you have gone on forever like Axle and written for five years or something?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Munk?

 

MUNKY: One month, (laughter) nope.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: How long did it take?

 

MUNKY: It took about, what was - the whole thing was eight months.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: But it really took about five to get all the songs. We did all the songs around five. To record them, I think it was done in like three. I mean what was that one song? I think the songs that when we felt like we had what we wanted and we wanted to start doing the record, because we wrote a whole bunch of other songs, when we did the other sessions with Bozzio. You think those - that the first batch of songs we did with Bozzio were like okay, were onto something cool here and lets go for it.

 

MUNKY: Yeah.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: That’s when we sat down with him and we wrote five songs. Don’t think there’s any particular one of those songs as if it was really cool and it sparked us creatively.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: So the songs like Ever Be and Love and Luxury, lyrically were those written like in the heat of the moment or what was your mindset at the time that you were writing those?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Those songs were just me venting about our ex-guitar player. I didn’t get really - I didn’t get it all out on the last record. This is the last time that we’ll ever speak anything about it because I love the guy I do, but I’m glad that he’s happy and doing his thing whatever. But those were just like, you know, I was just venting.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: All right, cool thanks. Ill let someone else jump in. Thank you.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you. This question comes from Clint Hale with 210 SA. Please go ahead.

 

CLINT HALE: Hey guys, how’s it going?

 

MALE SPEAKER: How you doing?

 

CLINT HALE: Pretty good. I’ve been following Family Values for a while and I was wondering, you know back in the day when it was starting out getting bands like Limp Bizkit and Ice Cube did you ever think there would be a day when you were kind of subbing out bands like that for a group like Evanescence which you know definitely have a different sound than those two?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: The whole Evanescence thing is, it’s in the same vein as why we started Family Values for which is a diversity of bands on the tour. Like with Limp Bizkit and Ice Cube, at that time rap/rock was really big and we were showing kids hip hop, rock kids hip hop, and hip hop kids rock and its how it was. And now I think that in this day we grabbed them because they are so different from what we do along with Hell Ya is different from Evanescence and Atreyu is different from Trivium. They’re all different in terms of bands and yeah, I guess were just keeping it in the same vein as what we started.

 

CLINT HALE: Okay, now obviously back when the rap/rock thing was big a lot of people kind of put you in with the Limp Bizkits and the bands like that. Did you ever think that was a fair assessment of where you were at the time regards to your sound or did you think you were a bit different than that?

 

MALE SPEAKER: Hell no, dude not rap rock. I didn’t rap for one. I think we had subtle hip hop influences like (inaudible) 808s and Gilby’s bass lines and some of the sample sounds that Munk and Head did at the time. It was kind of hip hop influence but it definitely wasn’t rap/rock, we were totally separate.

 

CLINT HALE: Cool, thanks a lot man.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions sir. Our next question comes from Dave Wedge with the Boston Herald. Sir, please go ahead.

 

DAVE WEDGE: Hey guys how you doing?

 

MALE SPEAKER: Good, good, what’s up?

 

DAVE WEDGE: Uh, not much; just had one quick question for you. You guys have talked a bit about some of the stuff with Head and all that. You guys have been around for a long time now, when you look at everything you’ve been through all the drama all the good stuff all the bad and where you’re at right now, how do you guys feel about where you’re at right now?

 

MALE SPEAKER: How do I feel about what?

 

DAVE WEDGE: How do you feel about where you’re at right now after all you’ve been through from the start?

 

MALE SPEAKER: It’s pretty unbelievable we’re still here. You know, a lot of gratitude, its amazing were still doing what we love doing and like I said there’s been a lot of drama but there’s been more good times than bad in this band. We’re just happy to still be here after all these years.

 

DAVE WEDGE: Excellent thank you very much, appreciate it.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your question Mr. Wedge. Our next question comes from Allan Sculley with Last Work Feature. Sir, please go ahead.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: Hey band. The Billboard article that was done not long ago kind of made the point that See You on the Other Side kind of represented a resurgence to the band and its popularity. You know its really hard these days to compare you know if you look at record sales you know where popularity is because everybody is down substantially what its been you know in the pre-downloading days and if you look at the numbers well yeah, maybe you are more popular. I’m not really sure but I’m curious; from your standpoint how you kind of judge your success or your popularity and I don’t know how you think it compares to where it was say when you did Follow the Leader or the Issues album. I think those were kind of the peak points in your career.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I think a band’s popularity isn’t really based on record sales because you can’t really just base it on that. I guess its really based on when we go out on the road and play shows and, you know when we did Family Values you see that other side it was a very successful tour, we played in front of over 400,000 people so definitely we saw a resurgence of, in a lot more people coming out to the shows; a lot of kids too. It was cool to see.

 

MUNKY: Like a new generation.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Like a new generation of kids, young kids. When we started most of our fans out there were 14, 15 years old when Korn came out and now they’re like lawyers and doctors and shit, its freaky, and they’re bringing their kids and there’s a lot of new kids its cool. So it transcends you know, generations now; it’s cool.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: Sounds like you think the drawing power of the band is pretty similar to what it would have been back around Issues.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Yeah man you cant judge it now because of the whole digital music because when we did Issues and Follow the Leader I think when we did what was it, Issues I think the first week we sold like half a million records in the first week. And now you do like one hundred, two hundred that’s huge. It’s totally a different business now; everything’s just, CDs have just fallen off.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: I do have just one other question. You talked a lot about Matt Head of Head not being around and Dave not being around, you know. I’m curious how it’s changed the chemistry of the band being down to three core members basically and I think the dynamic of the band has to be pretty different than what it was when it was five.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I definitely think that it’s totally changed, it definitely has. And I think that reflects in the last music we’ve done creatively what were doing its different now. You know for Munk, he’s taken on all the guitar diddies. He did an amazing, amazing job and he’s really grown as a player.

 

MUNKY: Thanks Jonathan.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: You’re welcome dude. You did a fuckin’ insane job. He’s good as a player; he’s come up with amazing melodies that I’m like where the hell did you get that? Matt leaving sort of forced him into that direction which has made him a better musician. Same way with (inaudible) and his bass playing and me vocally, I just had to step up and do this and I think the core of us which is me, Phil, Munk we bond together and the one thing we have in common you know is music is our passion, that’s what we live for. I mean I don’t think we’d be alive if we didn’t have our music to do this.

 

MUNKY: Its tough, also you adapt to your environment. You adapt to changes in your career no matter what you do.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: There’s always a process going through that.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: How do you think your music would be a little different if it was still all five of you?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I don’t know. I mean it can’t be tested, but I’m sure it would be way different.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: Okay, Ill let someone else go ahead for the next round. Thanks.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions Mr. Sculley. Our next question comes with Christina from Front Journal. Ma’am, please go ahead.

 

CHRISTINA FUOCO-KAIASINSKI: Hi, guys how are you?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNKY: Good, good.

 

CHRISTINA FUOCO-KAIASINSKI: I have a question for you. I was wondering, you sort of touched on this a little bit about how you’re kind of going back to the original mission of Family Values. What would you say was your main goal for this year for Family Values Tour?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: To create an event that everybody could afford to go to basically and just have a good time. You know we bring on a lot of different bands so that, I think the overall reason we do it is for kids to come and have fun every year. An event where, you know, music fans, all music fans can come get along and have a good time.

 

CHRISTINA FUOCO-KAIASINSKI: Thanks a lot and who was that speaking?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNKY: That was Mr. Davis, Mr. Davis.

 

CHRISTINA FUOCO-KAIASINSKI: Okay that’s what I thought, thanks.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your question. Our next question comes from Michael Kohli with Kohli’s Music Pit. Sir, please go ahead.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: Hey guys, how are you?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNKY: Were doing good.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: First of all I’d like to say great job on the new single. I’ve been addicted to it for the past like three weeks.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNKY: Awesome. Cool.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: I love the melodies on it. My first question is what is the most rewarding aspect of creating music to you, to you each?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: To me the most rewarding thing about creating music is it being heard by so many people and being able to create something out of nothing and touch people emotionally with it. That’s for me.

 

MUNKY: Yeah, I think for me, yeah creating a riff and then like listening to it back, when you go back into the control room and hearing it just come to life. It’s exciting.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: Cool. How about being Korn nowadays, now that it’s been a long time, like what percentage of being Korn is like a business, or are you guys still having fun are you guys still being happy being the band Korn? There’s a lot of times in the music industry kind of changes things over the years, Ill cut the question, but like what percentage are you guys still having fun with the band?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I mean if we aren’t having fun with it we shouldn’t be doing it. I think that’s why we employ great managers and tour managers and stuff like that to handle the business. Were definitely (inaudible) when big decisions come up and stuff like that we need to make and stuff like that we definitely get involved with that. But things on my side I just ignore the business side until you have to deal with it. It’s more about going out and jamming and writing good music and having fun. What do you think Munk?

 

MUNKY: Yeah, we always have fun. Even the things that we have to do, that kind of of, you know, make it seem like a job, we make it fun. We make the things that aren’t all that fun sometimes, we make it fun, even in our meetings. When we sit down and talk about business it’s usually fun. On a professional level we all get together and usually we have a lot of fun even in the more serious meetings and stuff that we have more business stuff and we joke and have a good time. I get that sense, (inaudible) a sense of gratitude. Were happy to all be sitting in this room making decisions, because I don’t want to work at McDonald’s, man.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: I have one political question. How do you guys feel about the conflict in Iraq?

 

MUNKY: I would like to see it be done and all those troops come home.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Me too. I think it really sucks and you know, it is what it is but we’d just really like to see everybody come home.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: And is Evolution or any of your songs, like does it have any influence on the political, or the Iraq thing or the state of where our world is now?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: No, none of this really was political. It’s more about the human race in general. Leave politics for politicians I guess.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: And Jonathan Davis, my partner and I, we were watching the Queen of the Damned, it’s like one of our favorite movies and stuff and I personally love how your tone to the music kind of kind of went with the whole movie and stuff. Do you have any movie projects in the future or any solo stuff or?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I’m getting ready to work on like an opera with Clyde Barker (sp) and Richard Gibbs (sp) who did Queen of the Damned with me.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: Oh, cool, cool.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: And right now it’s for the funding for it and once we get that were going to get started on it. That’s the only thing I have going on. Korn is my main thing man. I love it more than anything.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: And I was talking with Amy Lee last week and she was mentioning this. A question came out to her, were there any talk for any collaborations on stage in the Family Values and she mentioned too, and I came up with an idea just because she mentioned that she misses Soundgarden and wishes that they came back and stuff.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNK: Yeah.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: Like would you guys ever consider doing Outshine with her, like in Korn’s way and in her backing vocals way?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I don’t know, I don’t think so bro.

 

MUNKY: What was the question sorry?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: He wanted to know if we’d every do Outshine from Soundgarden with Amy Lee.

 

MICHAEL KORN: In your own Korn way, combining. Just an idea, just an idea, and do you guys still keep in touch with (inaudible) at all?

 

MALE SPEAKER: Who? Who’s that?

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: He used to work at the firm I guess.

 

MALE SPEAKER: No.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: Cool, well thank you very much.

 

MALE SPEAKERS: You’re welcome.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your questions sir. Our next question comes from Gary Graff with the Oakland Press. Sir, please go ahead.

 

GARY GRAFF: Yeah, jumping in on the Soundgarden question, but are you thinking about having maybe having (inaudible), but maybe thinking about recreating the Unplugged collaboration with Amy for Family Values?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: No, we felt like we did that, it was a special thing and that the acoustic thing that was that and were just going to leave it like that. It was a one time thing. This time were just about rocking out and doing an insane show for people.

 

GARY GRAFF: What is the Korn stage set going to be like, what kind of production?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Oh fuckin’ ridiculous man. I don’t want to give it away but it’s just, let’s just say it’s the hugest thing we’ve ever done.

 

GARY GRAFF: Is that in terms of setting or lights or?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: It’s everything. Lights, a new set list, songs, some of them that we haven’t played in ten years. The show just gradually goes and at the end it totally peaks. It’s going to be, its definitely different Korn stuff. The fans are going to be very happy.

 

GARY GRAFF: Now the question came up earlier and Jonathan I know you were much more involved in this. The selection of the specific bands to this tour, how did that work, what was some of the thinking this year?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: You know it really came down to here’s a list of bands that are available. We’ve seen them; the managers say you know this band is cool and we listen to them and we go pick them. And we set them up there and see if we can get them. And if they want to be on the Values they come with us; if not you know they go some other festival and it’s really that simple.

 

GARY GRAFF: Okay interesting. Now a specific song from the album, Love and Luxury, I noticed it’s about a more interested in how it developed musically because it’s a different song for Korn. I mean it’s almost a pop song in a way. What’s the story, you know of the melodic writing of that song?

 

JONATHAN DAIVS: Well it started out as a, the song started as a loop. It was a day that it was just me and Zac in the studio and I had this loop that I loved and I played it off of Ameco (sp) and uh, we started jamming it out and Zach put some keyboards over it and the next day Munky came in (inaudible), Munky came in and he worked that killer riff with the duh dunna duh over the top of it and it really was cool as all hell and then Atticus said go over there and play some drums and it just built off of a loop. All the songs that we write it just started with a riff or something kicks if off and we just start building it and it ended up being this really cool song. And I put my melody over top and it is what it is now.

 

GARY GRAFF: Is that something where that speaks of the development and evolution over the years? I mean when you work on earlier albums would you have been a little more apprehensive about taking the Korn sound further out?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I guess when we were kids yeah. It’s about us growing up and our minds opening up more I think. You know we weren’t necessarily worried about this time any comments, oh is this too poppy or this and that. We started that thinking back with Follow the Leader like this, we can’t put this out its got a disco beat or its too dancey like, it made us scared. And that’s something we like doing if we don’t do a song and put it out then were not scared about it then I guess were not doing it right. We always want to evolve and change.

 

GARY GRAFF: All right. Thanks a bunch.

 

OPERATOR: Okay, thank you for your questions sir. Again ladies and gentlemen if you would like to ask a question please press the star key followed by the one key on your touch tone phone now. That’s star one on your touch tone phone if you have a question. This next question comes from Roxie with Hard Drive. Please go ahead.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Roxie, no Roxie?

 

OPERATOR: Ma’am if you’ve got your mute button down.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Oh sorry, I had my mute button on. I wanted to say that I’ve listened to the album and it sounds amazing. I wanted to ask you specifically about the song Starting Over and do you think that maybe that might be the next single off this record?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Were throwing that one around. There’s a lot of other ones were throwing around. Don’t necessarily; we haven’t picked it yet but yeah, its one of our favorites.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: If you had your druthers, I mean what do you think you would want to pick.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I don’t know. What would you want to pick Munk?

 

MUNKY: Hold On.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I really like Hold On too.

 

MUNKY: I like Innocent Bystander too. Hold On, Innocent Bystander, (inaudible), those are my three that I think we should start looking at as the next single.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Yeah those are the three, Innocent, Starting and Hold On.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Now Guitar Hero is going to be a big part of this years Family Values tour. What are some of the songs you’ve mastered Jon?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I haven’t mastered really any of them. I haven’t had time. But I’ve got my rig out there and I’m going to be playing it. It should be fun.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Now how is it going to work exactly? Kids are going to compete on the second stage and then I guess how’s it going to work?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Kids are going to compete on the second stage and the winner of the second stage competition comes backstage and plays me or Munk or whoever wants to play.

 

MUNKY: I can’t play; I have a hard enough time playing my own guitar.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I got to get you started dude, it’s so fun.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: I love it, I love it. Jon I have seen the Devolution Evolution dot com site. I wanted to ask it’s sort of like it’s separated by birth situation there, with that one doctor.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Yeah, yeah I like the doctors.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Talk about that site a little bit if you would.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: We wanted to do something different and kind of that (inaudible) promotional of the album. The whole devolution evolution thing, shot these clips and we thought it would be funny if we were in it and I was J.D. Cornelius, Munk was Thelonius Monk and Billy was Dr. Fields or something and it’s just funny. It’s really cool, it’s a spoof on the whole thing and it’s just great.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: You also posted on the I Will Protect You up on the myspace. What’s the idea behind that song?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: We got to mention it, we were so stoked, we wanted to show the whole drum solo and the progressive thing we were doing on that song and so we, I got it. I didn’t even have it mastered I just threw up the mix and then a couple days later I threw up the master version. It was fun I just wanted to get it out there so the kids could hear the music.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Now I know it seems like its kind of a traditional though it seems like you kind of skipped it on the last album, but Korn always likes to put a little intro song on the record. Talk about the idea of coming up with an idea, you know how does a song become an intro song.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Well the intro was done basically Att did that and he took the melody from I Will Protect You, the middle part and turned it into this crazy Nightmare Before Christmas style intro. We thought it really worked; it set up the album nicely.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: And have you been getting much sleep with the little Zeppelin around now?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: It’s like every two hours, but its so worth it. He’s awesome.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: Okay I’m going to let you guys go.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS/MUNKY: Thanks Rox, later girl.

 

ROXIE MAISEL: See you tomorrow.

 

OPERATOR: Okay our next question comes form Allan Sculley with Last Work Feature. Please go ahead sir.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: Another question about the new album that kind of comes from something you said about just writing this album, that you really tried to go into it without putting up any boundaries whatsoever as far as what it was going to sound like or anything. I was wondering how different that was from other albums. Were there cases in the past maybe where you stopped yourself from doing something you did on this album?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Munk?

 

MUNKY: Sorry what was the question?

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: I was saying that I know you guys had said that you really tried not to have any boundaries musically for what you were going to do on the untitled record and I just wondered how different that was from past albums and times where maybe you stopped yourselves from pursuing an idea that you went ahead with maybe this time around.

 

MUNKY: I don’t know how to answer that. I don’t think we’ve ever, I mean I think early on when we were kids we were pretty close minded about stuff and there was things that were off limits that we wouldn’t do. As we got older and our minds opened up more we started to lose that mentality. I think that when we did Unplugged it opened our minds. I mean it didn’t directly affect this record; it’s just about being open minded and trying new things. I think naturally over time it evolved that those walls would break down and we just decided you know, anything goes.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: Are there any certain songs on the new record that are being more experimental in a way, I know you’ve used that word many times to describe the approach.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: I Will Protect You, that was pretty experimental, Innocent Bystander.

 

MUNKY: And even Ever Be.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: And Ever Be. You know we’ve got a lot of different time signatures on this record. We were experimenting with time signatures and even in Innocent Bystander there’s a solo and we’ve never done a solo. Munk does a solo. I think that every song is an experiment. The only closest song to a traditional Korn song is Hold On. You think Munk?

 

MUNKY: Yeah I’d agree.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: The rest of them were all just…

 

MALE SPEAKER: Ow, sorry I just stubbed my toe.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: They were all you know just a big science experiment.

 

ALLAN SCULLEY: Cool, Ill just open it up to anyone else. Thanks again.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you Mr. Sculley. Our next question comes from Michael Kohli from Kohli’s Music Pit. Sir, please go ahead.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: Hey guys I just have one more question, how do you guys feel about the whole myspace revolution. Does it help music promoting?

 

MUNKY: It helps promoting music.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: But it’s a pain in the ass.

 

MUNKY: It doesn’t help relationships one bit; nope, bad for the relationship.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Yeah its bad news. You get caught. Yeah dude. It gives you too much of an opportunity to, too much temptation. And it can become a pain in the ass sometimes.

 

MUNKY: But for music and for bands it’s great. It’s great; you get all that music and find all kinds of cool bands. And you can sell your own music on it now. Yeah. It’s cool.

 

MICHAEL KOHLI: Cool. Well thank you.

 

OPERATOR: Thank you for your question Mr. Kohli. Our next question comes from Gary Graff with the Oakland Press. Sir please go ahead.

 

GARY GRAFF: Hey guys, talk a little bit about the different drummers that are on the album and how that affected the album overall and what each one brought.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Well, Terry Bozzio came on with us and that guy has got to be the best drummer in the world hands down and he brought more of a kind of progressive feel to the band and pushed us in different areas because of all the different things. I mean the kit was ridiculously huge and all of the different colors and sounds he made with it definitely influenced us and pushed our music in different directions. Working with Brooks it was cool because he wrote the songs with The Matrix and we really wanted a live drums on them so we had Brooks come in and he’s an amazing session drummer and he took what we had before and made it his own and this guys got a ridiculous meter. He just made them I don’t know the way he plays they just pop out and sound amazing so that was an awesome experience too.

 

GARY GRAFF: Was there, you know, were you hoping that Terry was going to do the whole thing and maybe come on the road as well at one point?

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: We were hoping that would happen but it all came down to business and it just didn’t work out. Love the guy, you know he’s a great guy, it was just business stuff.

 

GARY GRAFF: Okay thank you.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: If you could put into words uh what you feel the lyrical and musical differences are between See You on the Other Side and this record.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: Do you want to start musically Munk?

 

MUNKY: Musically I think that I feel like See you on the Other Side was a bunch of songs we wrote and put on an album. This time it feels more like an album of songs instead of See you on the Other Side was just songs.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: Gotcha.

 

MUNKY: I feel that this one is more of, has an album feel. You have to listen to the whole thing for it to tell the story.

 

JONATHAN DAVIS: And lyrically you know I was in a different place than I was when I wrote See you on the Other Side so it’s going to be different.

 

KATHERINE TURMAN: So in terms of the song Starting Over you have the words happiness is boring, need pain instead. Is that something you still feel or is that the old you talking and are you really afraid that now that you’re life is kind of on a better path that God will take you out as you say?