A.A. WILLIAMS: PRESS/MARC TROJANOWSKI. JOE NALLY: PRESS/ANDY FORD
“My mate’s older brother introduced me to it – there’s always an older brother involved, isn’t there? I was into Metallica and The Offspring at the time, and I’d seen [Korn’s] Freak On A Leash video, but I was like, ‘Oh my God, like, should I be listening to this?’ I didn’t grow up in a metal or rock family. My mum’s downstairs listening to Marvin Gaye or something, and I’m upstairs giving it this weird screaming and thinking, ‘Fuck, I’m gonna get blasted!’ I’d never at that point heard anything like it.
“I’d be lying if I said I loved the whole album back-to-back, because I’ve never been a fan of the weird little interludes. But it put me on the path of heavier music, and when Iowa was released, I got it the day it came out. You were going into school, and all of a sudden that name was appearing on the Quicksilver bag in Tipp-Ex! Slipknot made things feel on edge and it was the first time, certainly in my generation, that I’d had that. This felt exciting. It felt terrifying. The intensity and the shock factor of Slipknot made me want to get my Metal Hammer magazines and find out more.