All Hope is Indeed Gone

Album: All Hope Is Gone

Artist: Slipknot

Genre: Nu-Metal

Year: 2008

Label: Roadrunner/Nuclear Blast

I would be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to this. After all, if there’s one thing in this world I derive pleasure from, it’s breaking crap records and throwing them on the fire to cook. And this record, All Hope is Gone by Slipknot, is going to be roasted like the pig on a spit that it is. Slipknot is the last gasp of the Nu-Metal era. Poor, brutish and short, the Nu-Metal era was a blight upon the musical landscape that allowed the world to know the horrors of bands such as Korn, Mudvayne, Disturbed and worst of all… Limp Bizkt. The reign was marked by travesty, controversy and misery. We are all lucky to have survived it intact. But though we struggle to move on with our lives, some people refuse to let it go. These people remember this time of grief, agony and debauchery and see their kingdom. These people would seek to resurrect the false gods of Rage Rock and restore their power, plunging the world into a second era of bleak wretchedness. If I have anything to say about it, this will not happen.

Slipknot hails from Des Moines, Iowa and they never should have left there. If they hadn’t, they wouldn’t have infected the world with their evil and perhaps we would have been spared the musical carnage they have wrought. A nine member band, Slipknot are my second favorite kind of band to review because they are bad, no bones about it. They sound like a pack of rabid animals trying to form a metal band and failing. Itchy and scratchy, these animals turn on themselves and those around them in an effort to spread their disease sonically. This disease causes the gut to clench, eyes to water and ears to bleed. If there was ever music that deserved a biohazard warning, this is it. What’s worse is that people like it. All Hope is Gone debuted at #1 on billboard 200, which means there are lots of people out there willing to expose themselves to harmful materials. It makes me gag, but I can sort of understand it to a certain extent. Slipknot is an extremely commercial band; if you want metal that’s easy to swallow and stomach turning all at the same time, they’re your men. There is a certain visceral appeal to the music as they’re almost animalistic in nature, but they ruin themselves on the choruses, which are obviously meant to draw crowds of consumers into their web. What’s more, the lyrics are ridiculous. Rage Rock is DEAD. I don’t know how to spell it out for you any clearer than that. It was never truly alive to begin with and centering your lyrics on all your favorite violent tendencies is absolutely childish. Corey Taylor’s voice can’t decide if it wants to be Phil Anselmo or Chino Moreno, and it doesn’t do either very well at all. Listening to the man is aggravating as he’s got the most annoying growls in the world and when he sings my ears feel like they’re being chewed on.

Is there anything, at this point, that I can say in Slipknot’s favor? Shockingly, yes. They’ve got a pretty good drummer. Some have called him the fastest drummer in the world which he’s not by any means, but he’s pretty damn speedy and while speed does not equal skill, there is some actual talent behind his ferocious battering of his kit. If the rest of the band was this good, there might have been some real power here but sadly, all the musicians manage to fall short of the mark. Slipknot are a bunch of speed-freaks who haven’t quite realized their time is over. We don’t need them, never did in the first place. If you haven’t yet caught on, they’re, stick a fork in it, done. And so is this review.