Recently, Slipknot and Stone Sour frontman Corey Taylor performed on the ShipRocked cruise which set sail from Texas and included stops in Costa Maya and Mexico. In addition to performing, Taylor also did a Q&A with fans where he was asked about wrestling and specifically NXT. Taylor, a longtime wrestling fan said: “I haven’t even watched the (NXT) 2.0. To me, it just looks like ‘WWE Light,’ to be honest. That’s not always bad, but the great thing about NXT was it didn’t feel developmental. It felt like you were getting a whole different company, you were getting a whole different promotion.”
“To me, the wrestling (in NXT) wasn’t as stiff. The wrestling was exciting. They let the wrestlers be themselves. Sadly, all of my favorite wrestlers from NXT, once they got called up, they didn’t do anything with them.”
Corey Taylor on NXT
Taylor went on to praise earlier incarnations of NXT, and also revealed how it came about that he and Slipknot collaborated musically with WWE. “To me, the wrestling (in NXT) wasn’t as stiff. The wrestling was exciting. They let the wrestlers be themselves. Sadly, all of my favorite wrestlers from NXT, once they got called up, they didn’t do anything with them.”
“About the music, they actually came to us, I have known certain people in that organization for a while. I met them through Chris Jericho, who is a good friend of mine. He had actually left the promotion right around the time they came to ask us if we wanted to do a collaboration with them, which I was all about. Not only did I get to do Slipknot with them, I also got to do some stuff with (solo debut) ‘CMFT.'”
Slipknot’s “All Out Life” was NXT’s theme song, and Taylor has expressed interest in possibly working in some capacity in the wrestling business. “Oh, man! I’ve thought about it – I’ve really thought about it,” he told Metro.co.uk in 2020. “Honestly, it’s one of the reasons why I try to stay in shape because you just never know! I don’t know if I could do a match, but I could probably be part of a storyline. I just thought… maybe, you know? You never know man, we’ll see what happens. I’d love for something to happen but you never know.”
Taylor revealed in the past he dreams of having a Wrestlemania moment, and it nearly came to fruition with Bray Wyatt before scheduling conflicts got in the way. He also got involved at a match between Baron Corbin and Samoa Joe at Aftershock Festival in the UK. “I was like, f*cking hell, freaking out! This was NXT in its infancy, so I’m seeing all the younger dudes who then popped and became f*cking main roster guys. I can remember Baron going, ‘OK, just don’t hit me in the ear. You can hit me (in the face), get me in the neck if you need to. Just sell the f**k out of it!’ I was like, ‘Alright dude!’ He’s so f*cking tall too, dude, I really had to shoot up on it!”
Taylor continued: “It always p*sses me off when people call it fake because it’s absolutely not fake. It may be predetermined, but it’s not fake. It takes skill, and it takes talent to be able to do that. I’ve always had respect for people who do it and I’m one of their more vehement defenders.”
