Review Summary: You all stare but you'll never see, there's something inside me.
Slipknot is a 9-piece band from Des Moines, Iowa that mixes hardcore energy and metal brutality with angst-ridden vocals and turntables/samples to give their music an atmosphere of creepiness and anger at the same time. All of the band members wore masks which reflected their personalities at the time, all of which would feel right at home in a serial killers collection and their music certainly contributes to their image. Love them or hate them, they took the world by storm when they appeared on the mainstream, and showed a heavier side of their genre to the masses. Slipknot's first album is a great example of how angry music can be.
I can see a lot of influences from Korn and Pantera in their sound, but they made it of their own here. Their macho posture and agonized vocals can be annoying sometimes, but when it works, it can be really great. The punchy, creepy atmosphere molds songs that sound like a man's disturbed mind fighting with his own past demons, something that reminds me of Nine Inch Nails' Downward Spiral, but not quite as well executed.
The album maintains itself in a heavy path, with some stalker-ish slower songs (compared to the rest) like "Prosthetics" and "Scissors" being exceptions. The heavy songs are simple, they have attacking riffs that can sound a little same-y sometimes, blistering percussions, angry vocals that can be melodic sometimes (like in "Wait And Bleed" and "Purity") and samples, turntables and bass that contribute to the spooky atmosphere. This works in songs like "(sic)", "Wait And Bleed" and "Liberate", but it brings a sense of similarity to some of the songs, that brings the album down a little.
When they walk outside the formula, it can be spectacular, like in "Purity", which has lyrics about a girl that was buried alive, and slower, creepier verses and claustrophobic heavier sections that gives it a legitimate horrifying vibe that they struggled to reach for on the rest of the album.
Here you can see a band fighting to find their identity, as they fight with their inner demons, and even if the lyrics are atrocious sometimes, their agony is transmitted to the listener. It is an energetic, angry ride that goes through all the types of impulses a insane mind can have.
Standout Tracks:
Purity
(sic)
Eyeless
Wait And Bleed
