David Silveria Countersuing Korn

First of all, I’d like to offer a heartfelt apology to David Silveria for leaving him off my list of potential replacements for Slipknot percussionist Chris Fehn. I meant no offense. I just naturally assumed he was too busy making music with his siqq new band and posting right wing memes and blurry photos to his Facebook page to join one of the biggest metal bands in the world. If he thinks he can juggle all those responsibilities and be in Slipknot, hey, I’m all for it.

Okay, fine. The truth is, I completely forgot Silveria existed until this morning, when I read on The Blast that the drummer is now countersuing his former bandmates in Korn. You may recall that last month, the group’s remaining original members — vocalist Jonathan Davis, guitarists James “Munky” Shaffer and Brian “Head” Welch, and bassist Fieldy Arvizu — sued the drummer for allegedly collecting royalties he’s not owed. That comes after Silveria sued the band in 2015 over unpaid earnings from after he left the group, claiming he never gave up his ownership stake in the Korn brand; that suit was settled out of court a year later, Korn klaims, with a lump sum payment to the drummer in exchange for forfeiture of any additional future earnings.

Silveria now claims that the 2016 settlement “omitted any reference to the 2003 agreement between the partnership and Sound Exchange and “was also silent on the issue of how Sound Exchange royalties were to be apportioned.” Silveria alleges that that the band entered into their deal with Sound Exchange without his knowledge and that he didn’t know they’d been receiving payments from Sound Exchange since 2003. So he’s suing for breach of contract, seeking damages in excess of $750,000.

Says Silveria himself of the countersuit:

“This is the only time I’m going to post on this. Yes I found out I was being stolen from. Click on the link of our original partnership agreement.You can clearly read everything is split 20% all across the board. This is not about the individual band members. For all I know they may have not even known about this theft. I feel so lucky that the 5 of us came together when we did. If it weren’t for the fans we would have just been guys playing in a rehearsal studio. But thanks to the fans around the world, we got to tour all over the world playing for millions of fans. Because of the fans my childhood dream became my reality. I will be forever grateful for that. This is all about business. I only want what I’m rightfully owed and thats it. I have no hard feelings towards any of the guys. We were brothers once and I love them all.”

That is a shockingly calm and reasonable stance for a Fox News enthusiast and a guy who thought Core 10 was a good idea.

So, nothing to do now I guess but wait for the lawyers to rack up those billable hours and figure this shit out. I think we should all take that time to celebrate Silveria’s successor in Korn, Ray Luzier, a great drummer who doesn’t have to concern himself with any of this other crap. Hoo-yay for Ray!