In the new year, Stone Sour will get into the studio to work on the follow-up to Audio Secrecy, and frontman Corey Taylor has offered some hints about what shape the new album might take. In early November, Taylor suggested the record would "probably [be] the biggest thing we've done in our career," but it's normal for a musician to promise big, bold things from a forthcoming album. But what was interesting was how he explained that the album would incorporate a "pretty grandiose idea that I've been kind of chewing on for a long time. On a musical scale, artistically, visually, we're going to swing for the fences with this one." When you talk like that, people start to wonder if you're working on a concept album. Well, in a more recent interview, it sounded like that might still very well be the plan.
Speaking with FasterLouder, Taylor discussed several things, including the future of Slipknot, but he was also asked about the forthcoming Stone Sour disc. And while he didn't confirm or deny his interview's question about rumors that it's going to be a "double concept album," he did delve into what he called the record's "pretty serious story" at its heart.
"It's basically the story of a man who's trying to figure it out," Taylor explained. "He can't figure out if he's happier when he's miserable, or if he's miserable about not being happy. It's almost like a midlife crisis in a way. He's young enough that he knows that there's still a lot of life to live, but he's old enough to realize that he can't be hung up on the romance of teenage depression and youthful aggression. Stuff like that. So he's really standing at the crossroads of his life, trying to figure out where he wants to go. There are stories about the people around him, stories about his romantic life, and there's really this internal struggle where he's going to burn forever or figure it out. Let's put it that way."
Sure sounds like a concept album, doesn't it?
One of the appealing elements of Audio Secrecy was how the album seemed to dramatize the dichotomy going on within Taylor, a man who had recently remarried after going through a divorce. The album balanced anger and hopefulness in equal measure, and it's possible this new record will do the same, albeit through the voice of a fictional character. Taylor calls the idea he has for the new record "very grand." Now let's see if he and the rest of the band can pull it off.
Follow Rock Music on Twitter
Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty Images.
Comments