Music News: Slipknot, System of a Down, Barack Obama and Robert Kennedy Jr.

Besides the way the title of this article is written, this is not a piece about politics. AudioPhix is a music site, of course. Still, when there are some fun tidbits that involve both music and politics (or in the case of one of the tidbits to follow, not so fun), we need to comment.

Let's start with some news about Slipknot. This specifically relates to Slipknot members Corey Taylor and Shawn "Clown" Crahan. They are being sued by the estate of former drummer Joey Jordison. Jordison passed away in 2021 after a long battle with acute transverse myelitis. But the suit brought by the estate says that Taylor and Crahan (and, therefore, Slipknot as a whole) had failed to return "at least 22 items" that belonged to Jordison and that Taylor and Crahan were using the items as part of the Knotfest, the name of Slipknot's tour.

The suit says the band was profiting off of some of Jordison's items as they were displayed during the tour as part of a museum piece. According to TMZ, the lawsuit was originally filed in July but the website just learned of it. Of course, Slipknot has had some recent issues in how they have let band members know they were out of the band, such as what happened with drummer Jay Weinberg in late 2023. A times it appears Slipknot is run by a bunch of inexperienced pre-teens.

Slipknot sued and System of a Down singer is cautious

In other news, Robert Kennedy, Jr. has recently made an effort to talk more about a situation involving Artsakh and the reported forced removal of 120,000 ethnic Armenians. System of a Down, especially vocalist Serj Tankian, has always been outspoken in his support of Armenians as Tankian's ancestry is Armenian. Tankian responded on social media to a recent post from Kennedy about the issue in Artsakh in classic Tankian style.

While giving Kennedy props for talking about the subject, one most of the world seemingly ignores, he also challenged Kennedy's motives for doing so. Kennedy is currently running for President as an independent and talking about subjects he did not seem to address before. So does Kennedy truly care about the Artsakh situation or is he just trying to find a niche to get people to vote for him?

Hence, Tankian's response to Kennedy when he posted that he appreciated Kennedy's support but, "...but can’t help wonder why he couldn’t have voiced it as a private citizen before running for office when numerous orgs reached out to him for the exact reason."

Barack Obama names-names

In other other news, former President Barack Obama shared his top songs of 2023 via a social media post last week. The list is fairly broad and includes such artists as Megan Thee Stallion to Jason Isbell. Of course, we always knew Obama was a music lover even back to when he was President.

He also hasn't been shy about naming his favorites. That's refreshing as well. This is especially true as Obama is not afraid of turning off voters with his excellent musical taste.

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