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| Lead vocalist Jonathan Davis |
To give a little bit of background on the band. Korn is a
nu metal rock band that has been around since 1993. Through the years the group has had success in each of their 10 studio albums. Each album for the most part had built off of the previous, creating a sound that has evolved slowly over the years. With their latest album, The Path of Totality, the sound has taken a more dramatic change than what most Korn listeners would expect.
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Korn's 2nd studio album
"Life is Peachy" |
Looking specifically at the previous works of this band with titles like
Life is Peachy,
Follow the Leader, and more recently,
See You On the Other Side, there is no doubt that this group has created a distinct and unique sound. What makes this new release different is that this sound that has evolved over the years has dramatically changed in one turn. Much of what this sound now revolves around has moved into an electronic feel. For those who have gone album looking to this old sound may have been turned away, but maybe that isn't all there is to look at. Although the band may seem like they have left everything behind for this new sound, we can first look at a few things before you make up your mind.
First off, it is clearly a new sound the band is playing with. In no way is there anything set in stone about keeping this new direction of music. With that, as the group plays with new sounds, the claim that the first one they decide on is the one they keep is a risky one at best. Moreover, expect to see some more sound play before the band conforms to a certain type.
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Skrillex,
One of the electronic artists
featured in ThePath of Totality |
However bad of an impact this album has had in its old fan base, it has made up for in its new one. The addition of new electronic sound brought with it an entirely new populous of listeners. Including artists that are featured in many of the tracks like
Skrillex and
Noisia brought attention from many sources beyond anything a standard Korn album could have. In that sense, the album was a success.
However distant this new sound seems to be from the old stuff, there is still core instrumental work tied in with this new electronic sound. The guitar and lead vocals
Jonathan Davis and
James "Munky" Shaffer respectively are still within the music itself. Another listen to every one of these tracks may have you thinking differently about what makes Korn so distinctive.
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Korn's 1999 album, Issues
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Another idea to point out that Korn tends to stick with its combination of slower tracks mixed in with thrashing fast paced ones throughout an album. That being said, there is a lot to look at in terms of The Path of Totality and how it does the same. With tracks like
Sanctuary and
My Wall stay slower and deep while
Narcissistic Cannibal and
Get Up turn the corner with the faced paced stuff. This can closely very closely relate to many of the previous albums this band has come out with. Taking a look at an example in the studio album
Issues, released in 1999, we see tracks like
Let's Get This Party Started and
Falling Away From Me that you see are fast and upbeat. And then you see that is slows down quite a bit with songs like
Counting, and
Hey Daddy. To this extent, the album does not stray far from the usual breakdown of how Korn formats and organizes their music. That core value has stuck.
Moving off of the instrumental work, if we strip down each song from this album taking away any electronically generated additives, we see that this music that has been claimed to have been destroyed is still there. I strongly urge you to take another listen to each and every song on this album. Listen to the bass work. Listen to the guitar work. Listen to the vocals. When it comes down to it, Korn has only added to their sound. Making the statement that featuring electronic influence had completely ruined the sound this band has grown to be a part of just cannot be true.
Before you create your opinion on this new release. Please keep in mind these points about the band. The core of this group still exists. The music is still here. Whatever else is added to it may seem different, but the same unique vocals, instrumentals, and lyrics you've heard over the years are still evident. This album yet another success in Korn's ever expanding list of titles. We may see an end to this long lasting legacy soon, but not today.
