Daily Dose July 17 - Slipknot, Pink Floyd

Currently listening - Slipknot's All Hope is Gone record

I realize Slipknot is not for everyone, but if you do like modern American metal, you can do no better. They have an extremely melodic approach to metal and Corey Taylor is actually a great singer, when he's singing. He does his fair amount of growling and screaming, but what's great about just about every one of Slipknot's songs is that they've all got a great hook.

I saw these guys live for the first time last summer and I got an all-new appreciation of their masked appearances. (For those who don't know, each member of the band wears a mask of some sort when they perform live.) I already love the whole theatrical side of rock and metal anyway. I mean, the first band I ever loved was KISS, and no one's more theatrical than them. However, Slipknot's masks are very different from KISS wearing makeup. With KISS, you can still see their expressions. Not so with a mask. Slipknot's members have the same expression for the entire show, no matter how fast or slow the song, no matter what they're doing... It may not seem like much, but when your live show consists of 9 guys creating some form of controlled mayhem onstage for 2 hours, the wearing of a single static expression is kinda eerie and wicked cool.

Anyway, I already loved their music, but after the live show, I'm definitely a true Slipknot fan. Here's hoping they are able to continue on despite the recent death of one of their founding members, bassist Paul Gray. I had the opportunity to meet Paul at this year's NAMM show and he was a very cool guy, so I was sorry to hear of his passing.

In unrelated news, I'm heading to a planetarium-style IMAX theater tonight to see back-to-back laser light shows. I've never been to any laser light shows before, but I remember there was some kind of touring production of a laser light show in the late 80s and early 90s that was all Pink Floyd music. Tonight, the first show is set to Beatles music and the second is set to the full performance of Dark Side of the Moon. I have high hopes, no pun intended (for you Floyd fans).

Born on July 17:
1948 - Geezer Butler (bassist, Black Sabbath/Ozzy Osbourne/Heaven and Hell)
1966 - Lou Barlow (bassist/vocalist, Dinosaur Jr/Folk Implosion/Sebadoh)
1975 - Paul Hinojos (guitarist, The Mars Volta)