Date: Thursday April 13, 2006
Date:
Thursday December18, 2003
In: Worcester
Magazine
By Charlene Arsenault
Title: Taking the slip out of knot - Band changes name, not direction
Ironically, the band that will surely
sail into oblivion with many of the other flavor-of-the-day metal that pleases
young brains, gets to keep the name Slipknot.
Around here, for more than 25 years, we’ve known Slipknot as the fun-time
jam band that plays a lot of Dead tunes. Within those parameters, they were
always at the top. Slipknot packed clubs, got top billing at lots of regional
summer jams, and hosts its own Slip Into and Slip Out of Summer outdoor bashes.
But Slipknot, the metal band that came on the scene in the late ’90s, is
a national machine with a corporate monster backing it.
Still, for years, the Slipknots (there are about four other Dead tributes
called Slipknot in the country) tried to co-exist. It doesn’t seem like
it would cause that much trouble, but it did. Every time the local Slipknot
played, particularly beyond this region, club-owners would get blasted with
calls of confusion.
Our Slipknot (to reiterate, the Grateful
Dead band from
“I think it became an issue of advertising,” says frontman
The official press release reads “This change was the result of another
band (from
According to the law, Mandaro says he probably could have fought and won
— making that “other” Slipknot change its name. But it would
take a lot of money, time and effort to do so. He’s just looking ahead
now, and has a year to use the “formerly Slipknot” tag in his ads.
“We’re fortunate that we still get out and play,” says
Mandaro. “As you know, the whole live music scene is hurting. We play two
to three times a month and practice once in awhile and do our recordings. The
Dead were just a one-of-a-kind, full-bodied experience that allowed people to
be part of something larger than themselves. The quality was just so good. This
music is just appealing to a large segment of society.”
And so is Slipknot ... soon to be The Knot. So with or without the Slip (hey,
isn’t that a band, too?), The Knot will continue to do what it does best
— bring a good jam to its good-natured fans. Say you were at the show the
last time they were called Slipknot Saturday night. We assure you, there
won’t be any metal there.
Date: Thursday December 18, 2003
On:
Sentinel and Enterprise.com
An agreement has apparently been reached
by the bands known as "Slipknot" with respect to use of the name.
In the wake of a lawsuit and countersuit
filed in Middlesex Superior Court by the respective groups with similar names
but differing styles (one being a dark metal band with freakish costumes, and
the other an improvisational jam band molded after the Grateful Dead), it
appears an agreement has been reached.
According to a statement by Slipknot's
(the jam band)
"Fans of this other Slipknot
continuously assaulted us with their displeasure at finding us instead of the
band they were looking for," he understated. "We finally thought it
time to confront the
Date: Thursday December 11, 2003
In:
Slipknot: the jam band truth
The
Slipknot was started in 1977 by guitarist
and vocalist,
Slipknot’s repertoire consists of
material by the Grateful Dead, Allman Brothers, The Band, Traffic, Bob Dylan,
and Eric Clapton to name a few.
Along with the covers, Slipknot also has original songs, that seem to
spring from the styles of the musicians they cover. Bruce and Mark write most of the
originals, and in 1997 they releases a studio album of original material called
“Slip Into Somewhere”.
Whether it’s their own material or a cover, Slipknot comes through
as a group of extremely talented musicians, and the audience notices and
appreciates it. At their last show
at Harper’s Ferry in
You may have noticed that there is
another Slipknot. In 1996 a metal
band from
Date: 1998
By Marc Edmonds
The death three years ago of Jerry Garcia
did more than just lead to the dissolution of one of the most successful
pop-culture phenoms of the late 20th century. It also delivered a harsh dose of
reality to thousands of Dead followers. Many had structured their entire lives
around the band's annual meanderings. With Garcia gone, a cause, a movement,
and, for some, a reason for being were gone. It was as if one man had died so
that millions could get a life. No sooner had Garcia been laid to rest, then,
it seemed, an entire industryful of tie-dyed and paisley-ed bands sprung up to
cater to his iconless flock. There are enough surrogates out there to make the
Dead's absence endurable. Phish (see Best National Groove/Jam Act, page 12) and
Dead spinoffs such as Bob Weir's Ratdog hit the concert trail often enough to
warrant keeping the tags on your old Microbus. This summer, the surviving
members of the Dead (minus Bill Kreutzmann) will hit the sheds as the Other
Ones as part of the Further Festival. Meanwhile, locally, an army of Dead-like
bands, such as Slipknot, Jiggle the Handle, and Another Planet will be keeping
the jam banner flying.
Slipknot don't fall into the
let's-write-confusing-lyrics-and-noodle-with-our guitars trap. Nor do they
adhere only to covers. They know that the Dead were superb roots musicians, and
that their mastery of folk, bluegrass, blues, and country is precisely what
made their music magical. Slipknot's is too, for many of the same reasons.
Guitarists
Together, they deliver original music
that recalls the Dead's earthiness without sounding like a calculated knockoff
of Uncle John's Band.
Date:
Wednesday May 08, 2002
On:
Chart Attack
Slipknot Jam-Band Prevails Over
Foul-Mouthed Maggots
Last week we told you about the confusion and controversy
surrounding the name behind the Iowan horror-rock band Slipknot. We mentioned
that a British knitting club website had been bombarded with abusive messages
from Slipknot's legions of "Maggots" (goon-speak for
"fans") and that a New England-based jam band, also named Slipknot,
had also felt the wrath of the Maggots.
The New England Slipknot (who, by the way,
are the original owners of the Slipknot moniker — they've in fact been
playing for over 20 years), wrote ChartAttack to correct a wee error in our
story. We reported on a nasty post from the Original Slipknot's website in
which an angered jam-band fan had wished that the nu metal Slipknot would be
"drowned in boiling menstraution [sic] blood." Anxious not to have
his fans painted as a bunch of uncouth louts, the Original Slipknot's
guitarist, Perry Seigle, wanted us to point out that it was actually a
Maggot that made the post, wishing that "we [the New England band] should
be boiled in that fine liquid." There you go.
Incidentally, this isn't the first mix-up
that the Original Slipknot (who by the way, are very good-natured about this
whole Maggot mess) have had with the schlock-rock band. Seigle says that
despite a friendly note on the home page of their website and the numerous
pictures of older dudes in tie-dye shirts, many a Maggot has mistaken the site
for that of the Iowan Slipknot, posting things like "Love The Masks!"
in the guest book (clever lot, ain't they?). Every once in a while they'll even
show up at the Original Slipknot's gigs, although Seigle says it isn't as much
of a problem as one may think.
"We will advertise 'New England's
Original Jam Rock Band, Slipknot' and they'll show up thinking it's the boys
from
"Most of them are too young to get into
the clubs, so we don't see too many Maggots there. However, when we do our
theatre shows or festivals, they do come out. They get very confused at
first… it's fun to watch. Like a fish out of water. Like they are
actually in pain. At the clubs, if they are old enough to get in, someone
usually can tell why they are there and we try to tell them before the show.
We've refunded money if they want to leave — that's cool. But the coolest
is they came to see the Iowa Slipknot (in a blues club?) and they end up
staying all night and dancing… they must have drank the kool-aid."
See, that positive hippie stuff does work.
Being the enlightened fellow that he is, Seigle has done his best to try to
reason with the young Maggots and, surprisingly enough, most of them aren't as
detestable as we'd like to believe.
"I have also found that most 'Maggots'
act like maggots only when they can be anonymous or in a group," Seigle
says. "I sometimes respond directly to a Maggot obviously lost and upset
and foaming through the eyes that they ended up on our 'Godamned old fart hippy
pussy site.' And I explain the name confusion. Who we are. Why we don't care
about the
Oh well, you can't win ’em all. Seigle
maintains that he's more amused by the confusion than anything and happily
points out that while the Iowa Slipknot probably doesn’t have "a
long shelf life, anyway," his jam-band have been around much longer than
most of the Maggots have been alive.
Chalk one up for peace, love and
understanding.
Date:
Wednesday May 08, 2002
On: Wormtown
Brian GoslowSLIPKNOT: UNMASKED
FOREVER!
For the past two years, two
groups, worlds apart musically, have been involved in a weird intergalactic
dance which has occasionally caused great (and sometimes humorous) confusion
between their two sets of devoted fans. One has been one of the region's most
stead forth touring acts; the other, which formed in
The Central Massachusetts Slipknot
came first. "I started Slipknot in 1977 to play the music I loved, which
included as much of what I liked as I could get people to play and audiences to
listen to," says guitarist
So, how often do fans of the
metallic Slipknot show up to see Mandaro and company? And has he ever heard
about an instance where a jam band loving fan turned out to see his group only
to receive a rude awakening? "We really only hear from the metal Slipknot
fans, and it's usually not fun — they tend to be rude, hostile and
immature — but when we've met them face to face they don't seem very
dangerous — they're usually pretty young. A couple of years ago a rep
from Roadrunner records, their record company, called and asked if we minded
them using the name — she said they knew we had the longest hold on the
trademark — and I told them I didn't like it very much. That obviously
didn't mean much. There is a lot more to the story of trying to fight their use
of the name — basically it could cost a lot of money that we don't have.
We are considering our options." The tale of two Slipknots was included in
a humorous piece in British music mag Select on the history of bands with the
same name.
There have been other instances
where a group using a name which unknowingly already was being used had to pay
the original group when they reached a level of success in which challenging
their copyright infringement carried the promise of a financial payment. In the
late 1970s, the Knack had to pay off an earlier act of the same name (who even
recorded for their same label); Nirvana had to make due to a 1960s psychedelic
outfit.
Considering Slipknot's next show
is a Halloween bash with
He is, however, having a great
time with his ongoing twice monthly
And fear not fans of Slipknot
Mark I, they're begun to lay the groundwork for a new album. "We've been
working on the material for another CD. We've got more than enough tunes, and
eventually we'll get them recorded — hopefully by the spring. Time is the
obstacle — having a new , eight months old now, baby girl takes up time
— as well as moving the family to Northampton and trying to get settled
in a new place."
After their show with