Corey Taylor (Slipknot/Stone Sour) Previews Solo Debut ‘CMFT’ with Two Songs, Including a Wild Music Video for ‘CMFT Must Be Stopped’

Corey Taylor is a man of musical multitudes.

Primarily known to the masses as as the lead vocalist of masked heavy metal marauders Slipknot, a position he’s held down since the band exploded with its self-titled 1999 debut album, Taylor has shared a ‘softer’ side with his band Stone Sour.

For his next project, Taylor is in full-on solo artist mode. That is to say, full-on rock star mode, if the music he’s released this week is any indication. His new solo record is titled CMFT (as in Corey Motherfuckin Taylor), and its lead single is “CMFT Must Be Stopped,” featuring Tech N9ne and Kid Bookie.

The song’s video features a host of cameos of Taylor’s hard-rock and metal friends, among them Marilyn Manson, Chris Jericho, Babymetal and many more. It’s a wild journey:

The second song released thus far from CMFT is “Black Eyes Blue,” which trades in the bombast of “CMFT Must Be Stopped” for some shimmery guitar rock reminiscent of the 1990s:

All of this might seem like a radical left-turn from Taylor’s “day job” in Slipknot, and it definitely is — it’s about as far-removed from the band’s dark, brooding metal as can be (take their 2019 album We Are Not Your Kind as an example of Slipknot’s enduring intensity). At the same time, it’s also very much who Corey Taylor the individual is.

He’s performed solo gigs over the years that very much encapsulate this “other side” of him, so to speak, channeling his heroes in classic rock and 1980s metal, among other eras.

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It's been a long time coming. My first solo record 'CMFT' drops worldwide on October 2 featuring the singles "CMFT Must Be Stopped" and "Black Eyes Blue". Pre-order a signed copy + watch the video premieres now at thecoreytaylor.com #CMFT

A post shared by Corey Taylor (@coreytaylor) on Jul 29, 2020 at 6:01am PDT

Corey Taylor is not afraid to catch you off-guard. In fact, he thrives on it. As he told Kerrang! this week of this new project:

“I love what I’ve done in the past, I love the projects that I’ve been attached to, but this, honestly, was probably the most enjoyable album that I’ve done since the first Slipknot album,” he enthuses. “There was such a sense of, ‘We’re doing it together.’ I hadn’t felt anything like that for a really long time, man. People grow apart, relationships become fractious… people stop liking each other sometimes, in certain bands, you know? But with this, it was totally different, because we were all friends before that. We just happened to all play together, and then we formed a band around that friendship, and it all really galvanised it.

“This has definitely made me appreciate making music again, let’s put it that way.”

A similar sentiment was expressed by Taylor in 2017, when Rock Cellar caught up with him at the NAMM Show:

The great thing about life is when you get little bit of luck, a little bit of talent and you bust your ass and you work — you get exactly what you needed.

So for me, I wouldn’t change a fuckin’ thing. Even the shit I went through as a kid, in my life, all the struggles I’ve dealt with, it’s all prepared me for today.

To regret any of that is to say that you regret the person that you are now and I’m the first to tell people that I’m the luckiest person on the planet. I’m still trying to figure out how the fuck I got away with all this.
I’m that guy. And then you talk to people and they’re like, “What are you talking about? You’re this, you’re that…” and I just don’t see myself that way. Just love the process.

I love going in and making an album and then I love the first six months of touring and after that I’m bored. I want to go back in and make another album.

CMFT will be available on Oct. 2. For this project, Taylor’s band features Christian Martucci (his band mate in Stone Sour) and Zach Throne, bassist Jason Christopher and drummer Dustin Schoenhofer.