Nothing's Scary

My wife didn't quite know what to say as I set off for the 'FamilyValues' Tour. Have a good time? Get real. Good luck? No kidding.Then I had an idea: 'Wish that nobody hits me.'

Listen to music from family values tour 1998 like Interlude #2, New Skin & more. Find the latest tracks, albums, and images from family values tour 1998. Format: CD, Year: 1999, Labels: Epic (494020 2), Immortal Records (494020 2), Barcode: 027, Length: 1:11:19 Release “The Family Values Tour 1998” by Various Artists - MusicBrainz Log In.

And so it was to be. As I gazed down upon the separatelyticketed mosh pit, the only sold-out sector of the 'parents-freezone' the Meadowlands arena was supposed to turn into, I didn'teven get jostled. Bummer. Here I was, primed for Armageddon, andthe scariest thing I saw all night was the Lincoln Tunnel at rushhour--a war zone regularly braved by the adults underwriting mostof these children of the Korn.

Really, I had expected more from a band that claims, notabsurdly, to be spearheading a new 'underground--what alternativeused to be.' Think of Korn headman Jonathan Davis as a populistPerry Farrell, more candid and original in his arena-rock amalgam,more cloddish and heartfelt in his sensationalism--and then there'sthe Lollapalooza connection. If Korn guitarist Munky hadn't comedown with viral meningitis, forcing the band off the 1997 edition,Farrell's alternafest might still be solvent. Instead Family Valuesmeans to pick up Lolla's pieces. The inaugural version includesKorn's 'death-pop' boutique-label signing Orgy, their rap-metalbuddies Limp Bizkit, their rap-cred standard bearer Ice Cube, andthe German pyro-for-pornos parodists Rammstein, signed up afterdeath-metal-for-newbies parodist Rob Zombie stalked off in a fit ofavarice. 'This is gonna be an annual thing, too, whether Korn is onit or not,' averred bassist Fieldy. 'We'll arrange it every yearand set up the bands who'll be on it.'

Family Values Tour 99

A big dream--but not a crazy one. In a hard-rock pattern thatimpresses every time it happens again, Bakersfield-via-L.A.'s Kornflogged its eponymous 1994 debut album platinum with no appreciableairplay or, need I mention, print coverage. On the road soincessantly their record company opened up a line of credit withMotel 6, on line incessantly with their fans after that, they wonthe hormone-stoked hearts of a new audience no one else had thoughtto service: the natural-born metal boys who slaked their masculinecravings with the gat-flashing speech rhythms of Ice-T, Sir Mix-a-Lot,and Dr. Dre. Alternafunk sexists from Trent Reznor to the RedHot Chili Peppers gesture toward these guys. The Beasties do too.But Korn addresses them directly, as a social formation, analienated suburban proletariat-in-the-making.

Jealous of their turf, Korn deny they're metal; that's JudasPriest, all four-four pomp and guitar solos. But they neverthelessdemonstrate that the essence of metal--an expressive mode itsometimes seems will be with us for as long as ordinary whiteboysfear girls, pity themselves, and are permitted to rage against aworld they'll never beat--is self-obliterating volume and self-aggrandizingdisplay. The genre isn't stagnant, just slow-moving.Korn appeal via the new mix they stir up freshest on their thirdalbum, the briefly No. 1 Follow the Leader. The 'underground' partis death-metal, the horrorshow sludge that owes its existence tothe vocal innovations of Mercedes McCambridge in The Exorcist. ButKorn roil the muck with a hyperactive rhythm section and landscapeit with eerie licks and odd bridges. Davis now calls up death-metal'ssignature groan mostly to prove he's still authentic. Heprefers a normal midrange--and sometimes he raps, recites, or scatsin it, which added to the beats is enough to get hip-hoppingwayfarers in line. His theatrical devices, meanwhile, play off themetal-derived histrionics of Farrell, Reznor, Marilyn Manson, andeven Kurt Cobain.

The social formation thus targeted is very white and verymale--at the Meadowlands, about 99 and 75 percent--with misogynyrampant. (Davis on 'K@#%!,' a/k/a 'Kunt,' from 1996's Life Is Peachy:'People think it's sexist but it isn't. It's moresubconscious bitching at all the women who've been with me in mylife.' Feel better now?) But Kornheads are nonracist enough toexperience a firsthand attraction to black music and nonhomophobicenough to sing along with the show-topping 'Faget,' in which Davisidentifies so explicitly with the high school pariah of the titlethat only a hopeless knucklehead could take it the wrong way. Youdon't have to like this stuff to grant its cultural legitimacy. Butit looked all too subcultural at the Meadowlands, with empty patchesover a 15,000-capacity hall. Pit action was augmented by determinedmoshing in the aisles and upper balcony once the inept gloom-glamof Orgy yielded to Limp Bizkit. But this wasn't enough for leadspokesperson Wes Borland, who kept warning, 'You motherfuckersbetter wake up.' Oh yeah? Or what?

Borland knew whereof he blustered. Bizkit, who put rap beforemetal and prove it by adding House of Pain's DJ Lethal to theirguitar-bass-drums, is a big band in this little world. The onlytimes their energy fed the crowd's, or quickened the dynamismdetectable on their CD, were a guest break dancer's very longheadspin and a cover of George Michael's 'Faith.' The token rapperwasn't much better--having instigated a droll chant of 'Fuck youIce Cube' and brought the eternal 'Fuck Tha Police' back to life,he collected his check in 30 minutes. Then we found out why we'dbeen waiting for Rammstein. Unlike most opera-rockers, frontmanTill Landemann's a bass, not a tenor, which makes all thedifference Ubermensch-wise. And his flaming armor and portablerocket launcher had nothing on the dildo-nozzled hose in his pants,which he let gob all over the crowd after mock-cornholing the half-baredass of the quaking keyb man in the off-the-shoulder top--theonly Rammer besides Landemann to do anything but stand there mock-roboticallypowering out an amped renovation of Hawkwind inoverdrive. What a rush. This was 'transgressive art' that no onecould take literally--outrageous shock-spectacle for a parents-freezone. With Korn, I worry kids might try it at home.

Family Values Tour 1998 Cd Changer

Jonathan Davis's great bond with his fans is an adolescentagony he's never gotten over. After trademarking the debut with acover depicting a little girl about to be raped or murdered in aplayground, an image far more open to misinterpretion than 'Faget'('Cool!' 'Heavy!' 'Wow!'), he took to blowing off against childabuse, but unlike such rock assholes as Axl Rose he doesn't claimhe was physically abused himself, and he wouldn't justify his ownill behavior if he did. Instead he obsesses on a coroner'sassistant job he 'jumped at' when he was 17: 'I thought, `Oh, it'llbe cool to see a dead body,' but I didn't realize I'd fall in lovewith it. And I did.' On the new 'Dead Bodies Everywhere,' he links thisnot unsexy nightmare to his fear of father: 'You really wantme to be a good son/Why? You make me feel like no one.' Fans knewthose words, and why not? They're the story of many kids' lives fora while. But though how much the same fans identify with 'My Giftto You' ('I kiss your lifeless skin'), 'Cameltosis' ('You trick-assslut'), or the tragic 'Seed' ('Do I need this fame?') remainsunclear, I'm parent enough to hope they can find a more fullyformed designated someone than a guy whose idea of transgressiveart is netcasting soft-core s&m to any teenager with a logon.

Often bands I admire attract fans I don't. The Beasties crowdsI've mingled with, for instance, have seemed too hip to be sofucking belligerent. I preferred the youthful enthusiasm at FamilyValues, where interest in s&m remained distinctly spectatorial. I'msure that for them Korn represents a passage out of innocence, astate of being Davis is so set on dissing he actually wrote a songattacking Mr. Rogers. But they haven't lost all of it, and here'shoping they never will. What holds back bands like Korn, MarilynManson, and White Zombie isn't how much they've been made tosuffer. Louis Armstrong grew up in the streets; George Jones's dadused to whip him until he sang. It's their inability to put itbehind them, and their determination to convince themselves andeveryone else that their truths have made them free.

Family Values Tour 2008

Village Voice, Oct. 13, 1998