During a recent interview with Music Radar, SLIPKNOT guitarist Jim Root spoke about how the lyrical themes on the band’s upcoming album, The End, So Far, have been affected by the “weird cultural moment” that we are living in at the moment.
“Everything is so bizarre and so bananas, I don’t even know what’s going on with the world right now,” he said. “I couldn’t even tell you what is going on with the culture, because, being locked up for two years, and then you come out and everything’s upside down, it’s really… I don’t get it.
“I thought rock ‘n’ roll, and punk and metal, and all that stuff was meant to be anti-establishment and against the man, and now it seems more and more like, ‘Obey!’ and do as you’re told sorta s**t, and that seems backwards to me. I don’t know if I am the only one that feels that way. I haven’t really talked to anyone in the band about it, ’cause we’re just trying to get through these tours, through the protocol and the COVID s**t, and all that.
“We haven’t really checked in with one another to see how we’re doing, how we’re feeling about the state of the world and all that, but when I hear a band that’s saying ‘F**k you, I won’t do what you tell me’ telling me to do what the government tells me to do, that seems backwards to me,” Root continued, apparently taking a jab at RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE, whose 1992 song “Killing In The Name” — featuring the verse “F**k you, I won’t do what you tell me” repeated 16 times — was written as a protest against the abuses of power.
“I think people are just so f**king sick and tired of sociopolitical content because you are just hammered with it, no matter if it’s a news cycle, a feed on social media, or any of that s**t,” he added. “What I get, when we go out and play shows, is people just don’t f**king care about that anymore. People have their issues, and people have their things they are concerned about. Yes, of course, and they always will. But for the most part people just wanna shut off, come out and forget about the world for a while, and they wanna have fun.”
The End, So Far will be released on September 30th on Roadrunner Records.
