Those that know me know that I love lots of heavy metal and alternative metal. When I say my favorite band is Korn, I usually get blank stares. “Meh, I liked their old stuff” I usually hear too.
I like nu metal in general, but why is Korn at the top? Because Korn is more than music.
Jonathan Davis may appear to be singing, but that’s just the musical facade. There’s more going on here than you realize. Jon is not some MTV kid that has been singing this whole time and is finally getting some big break in music. Jon is a guy with a troubled childhood, and he uses music as a therapy.
The idea behind this site stems from an assignment I was given in English class when I was in 9th grade. The point the teacher was trying to make was that everyone loves poetry; you just gotta know where to look for it. Music is poetry. The assignment was to pick a song that meant the most to you, and explain why it meant something to you. Explain the lyrics, explain the artists meaning, and then explain how you fit into all of this.
It took me a year to mull that over in my head, but when I stumbled across Korn in 2003, I was immediately hooked. At first, it was just the coolness of how the music sounded, but what really drew me in was the emotional release it provided. Jonathan Davis does not “sing”, he releases. He’s troubled, and messed up, and his time in front of that mic isn’t just a moment to sing a cool song… This is the time to attack any demons that have been eating away at him. Jon will go completely batshit insane, to the point of bursting into tears and writhing on the floor in emotional agony. I have yet to see another artist do the same. The music is therapy, not “just something cool.”
This music was, and still is my only therapy. I don’t do, nor have I ever confided in drugs (I’ve tried marijuana, and it was disappointing). I don’t have the courage/bravery/stupidity to be violent towards others or myself. All I could do was walk into school every day and feel… alienated. I never did, and still don’t, fit in anywhere. I’ve come to terms with that now, since I’ve realized no group is actually good enough for me to even want to be part of, but back then I wanted a place to call home.
I’d scream and unleash with the same emotional passion as Jon… Hell, sometimes I’d go beyond to the point of screaming so hard I pass out on the floor. “Why are you trying to make fun of me? You think it’s funny? What the fuck you think it does to me?” “I am ugly, please just go away” “Faggot! Faggot!” “I can’t control myself, I fuckin’ hate you!” “Won’t you get the fuck outta my face!” “Counting on me, always hoping I’ll be there for all of your problems, in turn you’re never there for me.”
The list of lyrics goes on and on. Every lyric was so closely identical to my own life, I sometimes felt Korn was secretly watching me, writing songs about my life for me so I could cope. It was as if for the first time, somehow, I had been heard and understood. That’s all I really wanted… to know I’d been heard. Even if Korn had never actually heard me physically, I felt spiritually I had been, and I had heard them in response.
I like an artist that gets so emotionally involved in the song that they lose all control. I love songs that have some kind of emotional release. And nobody could do that better than Korn.
I’ll get into the true meaning behind this song at another time, but in short, it’s about being sexually abused as a child and nobody giving a shit. Jon went to his parents about being sexually abused, and they didn’t believe him, and refused to believe it could happen. The ignorance… and needless to say, it didn’t stop. You’d think the one person you could go to about being abused is your own mother for comfort… and the horrible poser denied him. The ultimate feeling of betrayal. Your own god damned mother, the tallest-standing bastion of sanctuary to a child… and instead she ripped that facade away to show her true nature: a twisted monster of sickness.
By the end of the song, Jon is literally in tears, bawling his eyes out. This is why I am drawn to metal, and to Korn. That is why I listen to what I listen to. That emotional release… There is nothing stronger than that. No drug can compete with it. This is how therapy should be. And it works.