Ahead of the release of his new solo album, CMF2, set to arrive on September 15, Corey Taylor has discussed the themes that inspire and inform his song writing, noting that his musical projects outside Slipknot draw upon much more personal subject matter.
Speaking in a recent appearance on the Zach Sang Show, Slipknot's frontman explains that he regards his solo work as an incredibly vital creative outlet, not least because of his refusal, as an artist, to be defined by any specific sound. "This is me leaning into my inner singer songwriter to be honest because since I was a kid that's all I've really wanted to be," he maintains.
"All that a singer-songwriter does is they toil and they worry until they know it's perfect, and for me, that's what it's all about, writing a song that will entertain, that gets stuck in somebody's head and that will be just fun to play live. So that's what CMFT and CMF2 kind of represents, no matter the genre, whether it's heavy or the kind of Irish Country stuff that I write, the punk stuff that I've finally been able to do.
"With CMFT I can do anything you know, whereas with Slipknot, it's kind of a very specific vibe," he continues. "With this I can do anything and if people don't like it, fine - I'm not going to stop doing it. It's not for them, it's for me, because if I don't get to do that I'll fucking lose my mind. That for so many reasons makes a project like that the most personal.
"I co-produced it with Jay Rustin, I designed the artwork, I have written all of the videos, like it all comes from my brain, so it's very very personal to me and it's very important, almost to the point where I have to kind of make myself back off because if I don't include the hubris it will trigger something in me that's ugly".
When questioned as to what fuels his songwriting, Taylor responds: "I'm still very angry, there's still a lot of shit that pisses me off. I hate the fact that we live in a world where there are no facts, there are just fucking crazy people with websites and social media trying to make themselves sound smart by encouraging conspiracy theories because they're tired of elitist pricks making them feel like shit because they don't know enough. So with that alone I could write 12 concept albums.
"There's always going to be things that inspire me. Real life is always going to throw shit at you. I'm also somebody who deals with depression - have since I was a kid. I deal with physical depression which is a whole other fucking level. I deal with the PTSD from the abuse that I dealt with when I was a kid. I deal with the urges of addiction, I deal with just normal shit."
The vocalist goes on to explain how a large part of his personal trauma comes from a past marriage, explaining," I deal with the fact that for fucking eight years, I was married to the wrong woman and it sucked. It was a very toxic relationship and it ate a part of me that I don't know if I'll ever get back".
Questioned on whether he regrets that relationship, Taylor answers: "I can't regret it because we have a daughter together and I think at this point we both realised that it was a big mistake. It ended very ugly, but we both love our daughter and because of that we're able to communicate and we try to keep a lot of that away from her."
"It's changed the way I look at life," he continues, "because one wrong decision and then you wake up one day and you're like, I don't know who the fuck I am. And it's bad man, it will twist you out to the point where when you get away from it you are now this psychotic ball of emotion that is just trying to figure out what gives you joy".
Listen to the full episode below:
