Slipknot Exposed!

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Back to Part I

It was apparent that some of the bands that kids with tattoos and faces full of metal were paying money to see in concert and buy their CD’s were frauds!  Was Slipknot one of them?  I had to think this through to try and find out the truth, where should I look next. I remembered that I had gotten the intern from the record company’s home number just in case I needed it and I needed it right then! 

I called her and told her that Slipknot wasn’t at that studio and she said, yeah I know they cancelled the recording sessions at the last minute. They are all off on vacation somewhere. I asked her if they had returned home to Iowa, she laughed and said “I don’t think they live in Iowa. The story I heard from one of the long time secretaries is that they found the group through Lou Pearlman in Florida.” The name rang a bell but I couldn’t place it at that moment. I thanked her and told her I’d call her if I had any more questions. 

I had to find out where I had heard the name Lou Pearlman before, so I pulled out my laptop, attached the modem to the my cell phone modem adapter and got on the web.  Within a few page clicks, I had my answer Lou Pearlman was the boyband creator and manager. But what in the hell would he have to do with a nu metal band like Slipknot, he deals with teen pop acts?  I logged off the net, turned off my computer and called the airlines and booked a flight to Florida where Pearlman runs his operation. 

I found Lou Pearlman’s boyband factory without incident but security was tighter than Fort Knox, I couldn’t even get to the receptionist, let alone the lobby. This called for some research. I had to find a way in to talk to someone, the headman himself if it was possible but at every turn I hit dead-ends. There was no one who was willing to talk to me, even posing as a music journalist, I couldn’t get a publicist on the phone and I sure wasn’t able to chat with Pearlman. 

I did however in researching how I was going to get into the boyband factory manage to trackdown a former employee of Pearlman’s who still lived in the area. She was reluctant to speak with me but cash was tight and an offer of dinner and a hundred bucks persuaded her to meet with me. 

Hers was a sad story; she got caught up in the middle of a powerplay between Pearlman and one of his boybands, who after succeeding wanted to break free of their idol maker. She sided with the boyband and went with them once they left Pearlman but shortly after that they purged their ranks and since she was once a loyal lieutenant to Pearlman she was one of the first to get the axe. Because she got caught up in the battle over control of the group, she was labeled “persona non grata” within the music industry and was struggling to pay the bills by waitressing. So a hundred bucks was a good inducement for her to talk to me and hopefully reveal some of Pearlman’s secrets and shed some light on the mystery of whom the men behind the masks of Slipknot really are. 

From the beginning of our conversation she warned me that she had signed nondisclosure agreements and really couldn’t tell me much without feeling the full legal weight of the Pearlman machine come crashing down on her. I tried to ease her into the conversation; I first asked her how she came to work for Pearlman. 

“ I wanted to be a star. I was a singer/songwriter and I went to Mr. Pearlman hoping that he would like my music and take me on,” she said. “The problem is he usually only deals with pop music and mine was more alternative rock like Alanis and he also doesn’t like to take on singers who can write their own music or play instruments since they tend to start thinking they can make it on their own after they have some success and their egos start to grow. I can understand that, just look at David Cassidy!” 

“Mr. Perlman did like my music but he didn’t want me as an artist, he hired me on first as an assistant vocal couch and then I helped the in-house songwriting staff. The hit songs always came from the big outside songwriters but for demos and some b-sides we wrote the song in house,” she explained. “After about a year I became a scout. I would go around the country to high school choir recitals and other places where young people would sing and look for potential stars. Then I was assigned to be a special assistant to one of Mr. Pearlman’s biggest bands, that was what I did until I left his company.” 
 

After about fifteen minutes of conversation along these lines I finally broached the subject of Slipknot.  What did she know of the band Slipknot and Louis Pearlman’s involvement with them? She was reluctant to answer the question but she did say, “I really don’t know too much about that. There is a rumor that he put that group together but that would have been shortly before I went to work for him and I never heard anything officially. Just office gossip, you understand.” 

So I asked what rumors she heard and she looked down at her empty plate as if trying to draw the recollection from memory. “I really didn’t hear all that much, just that Mr. Pearlman didn’t want to put all of his eggs in one basket because he knew that sooner or later the pop and boyband trend would die and he would have to find something new. I’ve heard a few stories that he put together rap and metal bands like Slipknot and Insane Clown Posse with some of the singers he had under contract,” she explained. “Remember I never had first hand knowledge of this and it may just be rumors started by people who were jealous of Mr. Pearlman trying to discredit him or those bands.” 

I asked her what she heard about Slipknot and where they came from. “I really can’t say what I heard because of the nondisclosure agreements,” She paused for a moment to collect her thoughts and continued. “All I can tell you is I heard he found those boys for the band in a back street and put them together with some boys that came from the O Town”. 

As I jotted this new clue down, she smiled and reminded me that it was just rumors and she didn’t know who they really were or if they ever had anything to do with Pearlman. 

I thanked her for her time and paid the check. I returned to my motel room to find a message slip from the publisher of the magazine I was on this assignment for. I called him and explained what I had found out so far. He was silent as I relayed the story of the studio band and how I suspect that Slipknot might be in on that scam but he laughed after  I got to part of the former Pearlman assistant and her telling me about finding the boys in a back street and putting them together with some other guys from someplace called O Town. 

“Brilliant, bloody Brilliant!.” He exclaimed. “You have really gone round the bend haven’t you?” he asked me. 

“Boys from the back street and O-town, Louis Perlman and studio bands!” He laughed even harder, “that’s priceless! You’ve been given the run around and took the bait Spenser! Don’t you realize she told you that Slipknot is really the members of the Backstreet Boys and O-Town?” He laughed and I could picture him shaking his head as he went on, “you’ve been had, Spenser! Bloody Brilliant! Backstreet Boys and O-Town!!!” 

I ignored his laugher and tried to explain that I thought I was really on to something and he stopped me, “The assignment is over. We decided not to go with the story since a few members of Slipknot have side projects coming out where they won’t be wearing the masks”. 

I asked him about the studio band part and he said, “As awful as their music is, I believe they perform it themselves. Even if they didn’t, it’s not really news. KISS was well known to use studio hacks on their albums and no one cared.” 

Continued...