Written by Slipknot percussionist and band co-leader Shawn ‘Clown’ Crahan has revealed the life-changing moment that set him on the path to becoming a rock star. Speaking to Rick Rubin on the legendary producer’s Tetragrammaton podcast, Clown explains that it was while out shopping with his mother as a child that the future Slipknot man stumbled across Kiss‘ 1979 album Dynasty – and more specifically its artwork.
The album cover, which features close-up shots of the iconic painted faces of guitarist/vocalist Paul Stanley, bassist/vocalist Gene Simmons, guitarist Ace Frehley and drummer Peter Criss, had an immediate impact on the young Crahan.
“There was like a Walgreens in a mall and my mom was walking me in the mall, and they put the vinyl in the window, big long window,” he tells Rubin. “It had to be 30 foot long, and you just see all the new releases out in the front. And Kiss, Dynasty, the silver got me and the black got me, and I just stopped. I was just staring at Gene Simmons and my mom goes, ‘You like that?’ And I go, ‘Yeah. I don’t know. What is it?’ And she’s like, ‘Let’s go look.’
“And she goes, ‘What do you like about it? I’m like, ‘Look at this guy!’ I go, ‘I want to look like that. That’s me!’ And she goes, ‘What do you mean it’s you?’ I go, ‘I don’t know…is this a band?’ And she’s like, ‘Yeah, it’s a band and this is what they wear.’ And I was like, ‘If I was wearing makeup, I’d be this guy.'”
Sensing her son’s keen interest, Crahan’s mum earned an immeasurable amount of cool parent points by buying him the album, officially introducing him to rock ‘n’ roll and changing his life forever.
“So my mom’s like, ‘I’ll get it for you if you want it.’ I was like, ‘That’d be cool!'” Clown continues. “So, we got it, went right home, and I’d already been taught how to work vinyl, was listening to my mom’s records. But I can remember sitting in front of my mom’s stereo, just checking [Dynasty] out. And I’m an only child, so my imagination is where I live. So I can just sit there and I’m already playing things in my mind. So then [my parents] started buying me all the records. I remember they got me Destroyer next.
“And then my dad went on a trip and he came back with Kiss Alive II, and when I saw the picture of Gene on the back with the sweat and the blood, I was like, ‘Okay, this isn’t a bunch of guys just wearing makeup.'”
Of course, we know how this story ends: eventually, Shawn Crahan would help form Slipknot, carrying the spirit of Gene Simmons into the next generation by becoming one of millennial metal’s most iconic and colourful characters. Listen to his full chat with Rick Rubin below.
