Clown: "Our New Album Is Like Discovering Slipknot All Over Again…"

Shawn 'Clown' Crahan – aka #6 – has revealed to Kerrang! that the band's just-announced new album is like "discovering Slipknot all over again".

The follow-up to 2014's .5: The Gray Chapter, says Clown, has the same feeling and intensity as Slipknot's first emergence two decades ago. "You got a certain sort of war in ’98, and now you’re going to get another war in 2019," he teases.

While ’Knot frontman Corey Taylor initially compared the Iowa titans' new full-length – due for release on August 9 – as "Iowa levels of heavy," Clown adds that this is the equivalent of Slipknot's early days, only for a "new generation" of fans.

“I would have to say [the new album is] like discovering Slipknot all over again – but the way it always needed to be," Clown elaborates. "I’m not a fan of the sound quality of our first album, because there’s a noise in my head. I’m not speaking for anybody else here, and I’m not trying to take anything away, so, please, don’t fuck up my words here! The bottom line is, for me, there’s a noise in my head that’s constantly going as I grow old. When I started the band, I was 26 years old, okay? I’m going to be 50 in September, and the noise changes. So this album is like… not being given another chance, because we don’t need a chance. We’re here. But this album is like discovering us all over again as older human beings. You got a certain sort of war in ’98, and now you’re going to get another war in 2019.

“No albums are better or worse than each other, and they’re all important to our legacy, and our story. But what I’m trying to tell you is: that first album is like being smacked in the face with a garbage can, or a bat. It’s a fucking assault on your soul. With this album, because I don’t know what tomorrow is going to bring, I have to look at this being it. Every time we come out, people are like, ‘What’s Slipknot going to do? Who are they going to be?’ And I really feel this is like me coming out again. I can’t explain it. But it’s like discovering us all over again. We’re back to help the new generation discover it like they first did in ’98.”

You can read much more of our chat with Clown in the new issue of Kerrang!, out on Wednesday.

Check out the dates for Slipknot's Knotfest Roadshow tour in America, alongside Volbeat, Behemoth and Gojira.

July

26 Mountain View, CA, Shoreline Amphitheatre
27 San Bernardino, CA, San Manuel Amphitheater

August

01 Salt Lake City, UT, USANA Amphitheatre
03 Albuquerque, NM, sleta Amphitheater
04 Phoenix, AZ, Ak-Chin Pavilion
06 Denver, CO, Pepsi Center
08 Lincoln, NE, Pinnacle Bank Arena
10 Des Moines, IA, Iowa State Fairgrounds (Slipknot and Gojira only)
11 Tinley Park, IL, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre
12 Clarkston, MI, DTE Energy Music Theatre
14 Virginia Beach, VA, Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater
16 Noblesville, IN, Ruoff Home Mortgage Music Center
17 Bonner Springs, KS, Providence Medical Center Amphitheater
18 Maryland Heights, MO, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre
20 Toronto, ON, Budweiser Stage
21 Saratoga Springs, NY, Saratoga Performing Arts Center
23 Burgettstown, PA, KeyBank Pavilion
24 Scranton, PA, The Pavilion at Montage Mountain
25 Darien Center, NY, Darien Lake Amphitheater
27 Mansfield, MA, The Xfinity Center
28 Wantagh, NY, Northwell Health at Jones Beach Theater
30 Holmdel, NJ, PNC Bank Arts Center
31 Camden, NJ, BB&T Pavilion

September

01 Bristow, VA, Jiffy Lube Live
03 Alpharetta, GA, Ameris Bank Amphitheatre
04 Tampa, FL, MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Amphitheatre
06 Austin, TX, Austin 360 Amphitheater
07 Dallas, TX, Dos Equis Pavilion
08 The Woodlands, TX, The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion

Every pair of tickets for the 2019 Slipknot tour comes with a digital copy of their as-yet-untitled new album. Keep your eyes on Kerrang! for more album details when they're announced.

Tickets go on sale Friday March 8 at 10am local time.