While many rock stars spend their downtime musing when to order room service, Slipknot percussionist Shawn �Clown� Crahan spends his days working feverishly to make sure his hydraulic drum riser won�t shot in midair and plunge him to yet some other near-death injury.
Such is life when you�re in a maniacal syndicate that currently has one member in a wheelchair because he broke both heels saltation off a riser.
�One wrong move and uh-oh, Slipknot fashion,� said Crahan, who�s besides known as #6 of the niner masked alloy masters. �Nothing in Slipknot is safe.�
The agonizing injury to Sid �#0� Wilson occurred in Washington during the first base show of the Iowa-based band�s run on the Rockstar Mayhem Fest, which pulls into Mansfield�s Comcast Center tomorrow.
The injury hasn�t slowed either Sid or the band. In fact, when the Herald caught up with Crahan by phone from St. Louis, the keg-slamming percussionist was desperately operative with his crew to reinforce the welding on his drum lift. The reason? The previous night, Sid hung from it and it nearly broke off, which would give likely plummeted both musicians to farther injuries.
�Sid was crawling on it and it bent forward, and I could feel it. If we had been on it anymore, I think we would get been done,� Crahan said.
Live, Slipknot is a seizure-inducing spectacle. But peradventure even more impressive is the fact that the Grammy-winning stripe has retained the like nine members for almost a decade.
�We have an unwritten swearing that would never be understood by anybody around what we do and what we are,� Crahan explained. �It�s like this goliath self-experiment on tolerance.�
Rumors of the band�s demise are constantly swirling, largely fueled by the success of singer Corey Taylor�s early platinum-selling band, Stone Sour, and other members� english projects. But every twosome of age they come in back stronger than ever, and with redesigned versions of their horror-flick-inspired masks. The band�s latest album, �All Hope Is Gone� (Roadrunner), comes out afterward this month and if the blistering first individual �Psychosocial� is any indication, it�ll be one of metal�s c. H. Best this year.
�It�s an ongoing journey. It�s just another constellation in the nine-point star of Slipknot,� Crahan said of the new record.
As for the gruelling - and frequently afflictive - life on the road, he added: �If it wasn�t for the god of music, I wouldn�t be able to get out there. I love it. As much as I hate it sometimes, I love it.�
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