Korn

Liverpool KrazyHouse

Sunday August 25


Did Above All play this gig as advertised. No idea. I didn't see them, but there again, I spent 'kin hours on the shitty A roads before hooking up with the M6. What fun driving on bollocks roads in Britain can be.

Anyway, there was at least one support bands, whose name I didn't get, but who appear to have learnt how to say the word hello. Pretty good on first listen, plenty of stage diving, guitarist in ballaclave type thingy over his bonce. Colooured guy singing, which reminded me at times of Living Colour, Bad Brains and the mighty Dub War. All of which is probably way off the mark, but still they were good.

But ARE YOU READY. Sorry couldn't resist. Korn. So what to say. If you haven't heard of them or heard them by now, then do yourselfs a favour and get off those buttocks and aim your body in the direction of a decent record shopand cop a load of the CD. As on the album, Blind sets things off, and the one thing that's obvious, that gets said about no end of bands, is that everyone is into it. And I mean everyone. There was barely a person not moveing, and if you didn't want to, you had little choice in the matter anyway. Balltongue is next up, and it doesn't matter that probably everyone tries to make up their own words for the chorus bit. There are no words, hey, just keep on making your own up. The guitars are sick, sick in that god this is good sick way. I guess some would in a way level a RATM argument against them cos of the noises they come up with, but these are noises which make up songs, something I find RATM lacking in. Anyway, we're still in BallTongue, which contains what seems to be Jons standard We party rap. Man this is good.

Divine, Need To, it's following a similar pattern to Donington, before we arrive at a new song. Same as aired at Donington, and with only a couple of listens, it seems obvious that the new album, due in a matter of weeks, is gonna be well worth getting your hands on quickly. The band don't seem to be messing around anyway, but there seems to be a noticeable lift when they play the new stuff, understandable really. If the new stuff is any good, the band should be excited about getting to play it, and it certainly looks that way.

I think that it was time for the bagpipes next, the memory is a bit hazy, but Low Rider on the bagpipes is followed by a pretty big cheer and then Shoots and Ladders. You know the one, for those who wondered about the name Korn but can't quite place it. It's the one with the nursery rhymes as lyrics. Oh yeah, that one. Well, plenty of people know it even if you don't, witness the way the floor starts to bounce again.

A couple more of the album, Lies and Fake I think, though it may not have been in that order, and we get the second newbie. Again, I'm not sure on the title, but it's the one where jon say's to 'get out of my fucking face'. Quite a few times. And I don't think it was a reaction to the many stage divers that were around that night. Indeed, one of the road crew seemed to be getting quite heated about it all, and seemed to be having a good old dig at the security blokey. Waste of time, they were never gonna control the people, and it would've just caused more aggro. The band didn't seem to mind, and Jon seemed to put a helping, but comforting arm, around a few. Even though he looks intensly into the music and oblivious to all around, there's a showman in there as well, and it looks like someone who cares. Not the distance that you seem to get from Eddie Vedder and Chris Cornell and company.

So er, Munky seems to do the poses for the camera, Head adopts the strangest position I think I've seen yet for backing vocals, Fieldy just looks like he's in total control as he shuffles around stage. David, well you don't really see him behind the kit, but you know he's there, and Jon just controls virtually all the attention. You look round the others, but you're soon brought back to focus.

Anway, as with Donington, Fagget finishes things off, and there probably wasn't a need for Jon to actually do the singing. If you thought this was a new band, or people didn't know, then think again. It won't be long before you'l wish that you were able to honestly say that you say them at these sort of clubs gigs, in the same way people wish they could honestly say the same about Sepultura and Metallica before they sort of fucked up. There was no encore, shame, it may have taken hours to drive there and back, but it was worth it. Easily one of the gigs of the year.