In response to the copycat bands who've cribbed their sound while pointing out the folly of following blindly instead of making up one's own mind. KoRn's third album is called Follow the Leader, and the point is further driven home by the cover art depicting a little girl hopscotching off a cliff. In another sense, the title represents KoRn's elevated status in the hard music world - in a mere four years the band has become a platinum-plated success story, about to headline one of the most anticipated tours of the year. On a July afternoon six weeks before the album's release, I sat down with vocalist Jonathan Davis and bassist Fieldy Snutz to discuss the music, the tour and more.

G: Going into the studio, did you have a game plan?

J: The only thing we set out to do is take our time on this album. And reinvent ourselves, too. A lot of bands popped up sounding like us. It seemed like everything was starting to sound the same and we needed to change it.

G: Isn't there a risk in changing too much, getting too far from what people like you for to begin with? How far are you supposed to go?

F: I guess as much as you're willing to do. We know our boundary, I guess.

G: Are your fans willing to go wherever you take them?

F: Not if we took it to where we really wanted to take it. We could take it pretty far. We could go off the deep end writing some crazy shit that nobody would get. You have to put up a boundary. We're KoRn and we're always gonna be KoRn. If we have a need to do some crazy, funky shit, that's our side projects. We've talked about us all releasing solo records. That might happen.

G: Like KISS did?

F: Pretty much, but ours will be good!

J: Like Wu-Tang Clan did.

F: Might be coming up soon.

G: Even though you replaced him with Toby Wright, Steve Thompson is still listed as a producer in the album credits.

F: He was with us for four months. Gotta give the guy credit.

J: Before we never got to put our names on any of our albums which we did produce. We just gave it all to Ross (Robinson).

F: He was the cheerleader pretty much and we were producing our shit.

J: This one was a team effort.

F: Somebody that really helped a lot was Caco, our tech. He did a lot with the guitar sounds and getting pedals ready. He'd get a lot of effects.

G: Changing producers midstream and having to do things over must have been frustrating.

J: Very. But hearing the album now, and the change we made, it was all worth it. When we heard the first mixes it sounded foreign to us, not right, but we were all used to hearing shitty music. Now that I hear it it's "Oh my God!" I'm glad we made the change. It was good for us and we deserved it.

G: What was the writing process like?

F: It's the same all the way through. We write the music and he does the lyrics and then the song comes together. It's drums, bass guitars, and vocals, that's how we write. Pretty much every song in that order. It's a process that works for us.

G: I know you started with 18 songs. What happens to the leftovers?

J: B-sides, soundtracks, stuff like that. They'll be out. They're gonna be heard.

G: Each of your albums has gone platinum. Does that put pressure on you in the studio?

F: Yes. It's more pressure for me than you can imagine. Even having it done and mastered now, and finished. I felt like someone took a million pounds off my shoulders. This album for me was more stressful than any of them. And this is our best work. I was more confident about this but more stressed about it.

G: From trying to top the last one?

F: I don't even know if that's it. I don't know what the stress is, that's why I have anxiety. I'm stressed out.

G: You must feel some relief now that the album's done.

J: Yeah, but it's all starting again.

F: Different stress. Press all week. We're gonna start rehearsing to go to Japan, we go Aug, 2.

G: Your Family Values Tour starts in mid-September. What can fans expect?

F: I think they can expect to see the best tour they've ever seen in their lives. It's gonna be so energetic al the way through. That's what people have been wanting for years and years and it's never been done. I haven't seen it once. You always have these big tours with these bands...OZZfest is pretty much metal. The change up for us is Ice Cube, but our fans love Ice Cube. He'll be doing a song with us every night.

G: Is there a midway with booths and such?

F: I'm sure we'll do the full Lollapalooza kind of thing.

J: Maybe a booth against censorship, the PMRC. The whole Family Values thing, we're making a joke about Tipper Gore and the PMRC.

G: Do you have the itinerary?

F: No, not yet. You'd have to talk to our manager. We're just dumb band members. "You gotta get on a plane tomorrow." "Oh, OK." I don't know where the first show is.

J: We're pretty hands on; when it comes down to it, it's our decision. But we have enough stress, we don't need all that added shit on top.

G: Do you record your shows? Might there be a live record?

J: We record every show. We've got a whole library of shows.

F: I hate live records. They sound like shit.

J: I do too.

F: There are bootleg live CDs. They suck, we don't get paid. (Bootleggers) are making more money than us!

G: Have you decided on a set list?

F: No, we'll decide the day we go in the studio. Whoever's feeling up to it will write it out and we'll go, "switch that song" or whatever.

G: Will you work up a lot more than you play so you can mix it up?

F: No, when you get to bigger shows you have to keep the same set every night because of the lights. They're programmed to the set so you can't switch it around.

J: If you want it to be a nice, tight show.

F: We worked our whole lives to get a light show and now that we finally have one we have to play the same set every night.

G: Any local warm-up shows planned?

F: Probably.

J: I'd like to get a warehouse and kegs.

F: A party vibe rather than playing at a club. That's how we got started.

G: Still involved in the Net?

J: We have a big two hour show coming up before the album comes out, a big extravaganza, that will be on the Internet. KoRn TV is going to go on. Once we go on tour we can do that> We're gonna pre-tape shit and put it out every Thursday. And you'll see what's going on on tour. We'll have the people we're out with, broadcasts, we'll do it live sometimes.

G: Are you playing outdoors on the tour?

F: No. We hate playing outdoors 'cause the sound sucks.

J: It's not rock 'n' roll either. All our shows are indoors, arenas. It's back to the days of arena rock. When you play a shed it's daytime when the band first goes on and there's no vibe at all.

F: When you see a rock 'n' roll band you want to see then in the dark, with lights, everything. I don't think there's any vibe at all at an outdoor show. It looks like four dudes standing there with guitars.

G: Do you enjoy the studio and the road equally?

J: We totally love the studio, it's time to create. I love it, he loves it. The whole band does. But the road is what we do, it's fun, it's the best. It's two different modes.

F: Doing a record, I love it, I never get homesick or anything like that. When you go on tour, you love playing live every night, but you get homesick, you get lonely.

G: Congratulations on your marriage, by the way. Is your wife going to join you on the tour?

F: She comes out sometimes. But we have a daughter, nine months, and she's five months pregnant. So if anything I'll fly home of we have a couple days off. She's due in December and it will work out because he"s going on a honeymoon and then we have Christmas. We'll probably take December off. We're not gonna tour our asses off like we did last time. It was really hard. I remember one of the bus drivers saying it was the hardest tour he'd been on in 20 years. The days off we and we were playing somewhere else. We toured hard, like a day off every two weeks. Nobody does that. But I don't regret it 'cause we broke. We'll probably take off till Dec. 26 and then start touring again on the 27th.

J: We want to go to Europe, States, we want to start a world tour in January.

F: We'll probably tour for a year and a half, two years.

J: At least. We'll be doing our same touring but at least we'll have the ability to fly, keep our heads straight. Have a day off every three days.

G: Do you fly or ride the bus between gigs?

F: If we have like a 25 hour drive we'd fly. I hate flying. Sometimes the whole band will fly but me and him will take the bus, drink the whole way, sleep on the bus. It's more fun to sit on the bus and watch movies and wake up and you're at the hotel. Flights are so inconvenient. You have to get up early, go to the airport.

G: What about a private plane?

J: I don't think we're at the level yet to do that.

F: Unless our business manager say we have to get one for a tax write-off I don't think we'll ever get a jet because I'm not into wasting money. I would rather ride the bus and the money in our pockets. And it's more fun.

J: Usually we drive all night and sleep on the bus.

F: If we have an overnight drive we'll have like two shower rooms. We'll shower at the venue or maybe have a runner take us back to the hotel during the day.

G: Once the tour starts do you have less stress?

F: No, I'm the worst on the road. I'm a wreck on the road. There's a lot of pressure.

J: Ultimately it's on your ass because you're up there on stage and kids are looking at you.

G: But if you know what you're doing.....

F: We do, but still it doesn't work. It doesn't help when you have in-store signings all day and press and phoners on top of the show.

J: That's mentally hard. We don't regret anything we've done but looking back on it we were killing ourselves. It was fun, but it wasn't.

F: It was necessary. Part of the gig.

J: It's all gonna benefit us and we take that into consideration and go through that hell. It's worth it. I hope.

G: Do you feel that the climate for heavy music has gotten better?

J: It's getting there. It's getting accepted more and more. Kids are wanting heavy music now. The 90's sucked for music basically. Kids are sick of it, they want to hear something heavy, what rock 'n' roll is supposedly all about. With the alternative bands, there was nothing to grasp onto or hold close. It seems like the only bands that have careers are heavy bands, R&B artists, and rap acts. Alternative bands have dropped off. Kids are tired of hearing wimpy shit. They want to hear something that gets their adrenaline pumping. For me, that's what music's all about.

G: Is heavy music what you listened to growing up?

J: Yeah, I only switched when I got into high school. During the 7th and 8th grade, New Wave. In the 70's and 80's New Wave, metal, hair bands were cool, it all coexisted. It was fun and exciting. With the grunge scene everything got fucked. I think history repeats itself and it will be rock 'n' roll again.

G: Do you think this album might break on radio?

F: Yeah. But even if we had a huge radio hit, this record is so cool it wont matter. If radio decides to accept us I don't think it will ever make a band like us a one hit wonder. (The music is) too streetsounding. What will happen, you'll fast forward through the radio hit and listen to the rest of the CD.

G: What goals do you set now?

J: Be as big as possible.

F: That's why you make music, you want people to hear it.

J: We want to be like Led Zepplin. Those guys never compromised and took the world by storm, they were the biggest band ever. We aspire to that but we're taking baby steps. Metallica too, they had the credibility without any airplay. I was never a big Metallica fan. I didn't buy all the albums, but after I did and listened to 'em I like the old stuff. I'm not trying to disrespect them because I must say that the band treated us the best on their tour. Every tour we went on we got treated like shit, but those guys treated us like royalty.

G: Now that you're headlining position. Do you treat your opening acts well?

J: We've always been cool to bands

F: We got treated like shit and we're never doing that to bands. We'd invite them on our bus to go to the next city. We had Incubus out with us and they weren't getting catering so we got on the phone, "What the fuck? They have to eat!" and we got, "You dudes are costing so much money." We don't give a fuck. They need to eat.

J: We want everyone to be happy when they walk through the hall.

F: If it costs us a little bit of money out of our pocket to have a band be happy, so it does. We bring bands out that we like. It's not like some bands that bring somebody out for ticket sales. Family Values -- it's a family.

J: We've only not done that once. I wont say the band. We didn't dick anyone over, we just didn't know them. Monster Magnet. They didn't hang out, they'd play show and run to the bus. It was a six week tour and I probably talked to the singer once. I don't even know their names. The whole motto of our band is you gotta have fun with what you're doing.

F: You gotta bring bands out that you have a good time with. Something I wish Deftones could have realized, we asked them, almost to the point of begging them, many times, to be on the Family Values because we're friends with them and we would have had a good time hanging out every night. But they said no and they took a bullshit tour that they're hating right now. They were playing stupid like "we're not going on before Limp Bizkit." Who cares when who goes on? I'm sure if we talked to Limp Bizkit they'd switch slots, I told them that. We're trying to make a family thing and have a good time. But their managers talked some shit into their heads. Whatever. They're missing out on what's gonna be the funnest tour of all time.

G: Anything else to say to your fans?

J: I want to say thank you for sticking it out with us. It's been a long-ass trek for us with a lot of things going on. Thanks for being so loyal to us. This album is for them because we think we gypped them on the second album because we were so rushed.

G: If you could do it over, would you?

J: It served its purpose and we wouldn't change anything right now.

F: I wouldn't change the way the songs are but I'd really like to remix it because it sounds so muddy. The songs are good songs. The songs are good and people love it but I'd like to have Brendan (O'Brien) remix it, not even tell anyone. People that buy the new one will think it really sounds good...It's just taking the mud out, clarifying it.

G: But you're happy with the way the new one sounds?

F: 100%

G: Are you thinking about the next record yet?

J: I am.

F: I am, too.

J: We found a new niche for ourselves that we're totally experimenting with and now we have it in our heads to do some real shit.

F: The thing I'm looking forward to is when we start the Family Values tour, maybe get into it a week and start to record some new songs. I can't wait.

G: Do you think you'd use songs that are so old when you go into the studio next time?

F: Yeah, you get a chance to live with it and make it better. We put a song on this record that was written seven yours ago, "My Gift To You." It was a song in one of our old bands and then we did it with Jonathan five years ago when he got in the band, and then we dumped it. We just changed the choruses. The main riff to the song is the same. If you heard the original you'd say it's the same.

J: We started it as a joke. We started playing it one day when we were bored and everyone's going "That's pretty cool. Let's work on it." And we worked it up.

F: It's the heaviest chorus we're ever written.

G: Even with all the hassles, changing producers, the pressures, it seems like you had a good time making the record.

J: We did. We wouldn't do this if we weren't having fun. That's the motto of the band. If it's not fun then why do it? You get in a band because you love what you do. It's not a job. I'm stressed out doing this but it's fun. I love what we're doing and trying to do. Ultimately it was meant to be. *