1994 In Review: Korn - S/T

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This one might be a tough sell.

Whether or not you see the debut album from Korn as a pioneering release for hard music or the harbinger of hard music's ruination depends largely on your opinion of what came after. If you subscribe to the latter group, you likely lament that Korn begat Limp Bizkit begat Staind begat Puddle of Mudd, so on, so forth. Of course, it's a little silly to blame Korn for Puddle of Mudd, but they've made themselves easy targets with a string of albums over the past fifteen years or so that hover somewhere between "diminishing returns" and "gaudy embarrassments".

But let's forget everything that came after for just a moment, and remember that there was a time twenty years ago when nothing like Korn existed. Their unique blend of bowel shaking tones, hip hop rhythms and explicit anguish officially ushered in the genre later labeled as "nu metal", for better or worse.

Korn doesn't speak to a 38 year old the same way it does to an 18 year old, and I'll be first to admit that the two decades that have followed its release haven't done it any favours. For a man my age to try and explain it in a way that paints it as a true classic is certainly a fool's errand; this record simply doesn't compare to the other albums I've given the anniversary treatment to. However, in its defense, it was never intended as a point of comparison. In terms of style and substance, Korn was an island far away from the flannel mainland. 

It may not be a misunderstood masterpiece (frankly, much of Korn is too immature to even be taken seriously), but it isn't worthless either. Its success may have led to a string of inferior albums and associated acts, but Korn's importance cannot be understated in that it literally changed the course of heavy music forever. We don't necessarily have to laud them for it, but at the very least we can agree that hearing guttural guitar tones accompanied by bagpipes and nursery rhymes brought a smile to our faces.

October 11, 1994 • Immortal/Epic
Highlights Blind • Need To • Clown

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