SLIPKNOT: All Hope is Gone

Produced by David Fortman and Slipknot

Released: August 25

First of all I have to admit that I am not what could be described as a Slipknot "fan", but I don't hate them either. When I heard their first album at a friend's place years ago, I wondered why it took ten guys to make an album that sounded like five or six blokes at the most. I still wonder why they need a sampler and a DJ and a drummer and two percussionists, but there's no real reason Iron Maiden needs three guitarists either. The masks I can live with. Most performers adopt some kind of mask on stage in any case, even if it isn't a physical one, and legends like KISS, Alice Cooper, King Diamond, Bowie and dozens of others have made careers out of similar gimmicks so that aspect is really a moot point. Musically, both Slipknot and Iowa were far edgier, heavier and just more dangerous sounding than any of their generic counterparts like Mudvayne, Disturbed, Papa Roach or any of the myriad other clones that came in the wake of Korn could ever have hoped to have been, and there could be no doubting their influence and popularity. Slipknot probably turned more fans onto metal than any other band since Pantera, and have been about as contentious.

After their spectacular early success the wheels began to fall off, with key members spending valuable time on other projects and Joey Jordison playing drums for anyone who'd let him while he drank whatever he could get his hands on. Somehow though, possibly through the power of contractual obligation, Slipknot has held on and returned for a fourth bite of the cherry with the perhaps prophetically-titled All Hope is Gone. Their legions of fans have put this on the top of the charts within a day of release, probably even before most of them had a chance to listen to it, because if they had some of them may have been less eager to add this to their collections.

".execute." starts the album as a nice piece of dark atmospherics (Craig Jones and Sid Wilson still have to do something I suppose) leading into the very promising "Gematria (The Killing Name)", groove-laden, heavy and politically-charged with a modern thrash feel. It's a good beginning, but one immediately tempered by "Sulfur", a generic metalcore song that any band could do. And so it goes for the rest of the album. For every arse-ripping barrage like "Butcher's Hook", the awesome "This Cold Black" or the outstanding title track that shares the honours with the opener as the best thing on here, there's other songs that leave you wondering what they were thinking. "Dead Memories" is some kind of industrialised emo power ballad mess. Then there's "Snuff", where the band ditches any trace of integrity as an aggressive and scary metal beast and makes a grab for the mainstream rock radio market in the same way that, say, Limp Bizkit did with "Behind Blue Eyes". This is even more ridiculous however, because it's almost impossible to imagine a bunch of guys wearing boilersuits, Pinocchio noses and rapist's masks with nine inch nails sticking out of them doing a convincing acoustic love ballad. It's just goofy beyond comprehension.

Overall too, even the better songs feel like they were just slapped together piecemeal from ideas they had left over and a few they borrowed from other bands. David Fortman has done an admirable job on the production side, however, especially with a more distinguishable separation between Jordison's drum efforts and those of the percussionist duo, something that hasn't been captured all that well in the past (note "Wherein Lies Continue" in particular for this). Even so, most of the time it sounds like Fortman was the only one trying that much, and it could well be that Slipknot just doesn't have it in them anymore.

Slipknot used to be leaders. Now as half of them teeter on the brink of middle age, they're just throwing together a bunch of trendy ideas to help fund their other bands or their retirement. At least Metallica lasted four albums before they started losing the plot, and at least they still care enough to try and make a decent album this time around.

1. .execute.
2. Gematria (The Killing Name)
3. Sulfur
4. Psychosocial
5. Dead Memories
6. Vendetta
7. Butcher's Hook
8. Gehenna
9. This Cold Black
10. Wherein Lies Continue
11. Snuff
12. All Hope is Gone

Rating: 65%