If some comments on the internet were to be believed last week, Slipknot were in serious trouble heading into their Sunday night headline set at this year's Download festival. In some ways, it was an understandable stance to take: in the space of just one day (June 7), two bombshells dropped. First, it emerged that the band's beloved co-founder and percussionist, Shawn 'Clown' Crahan', would be sitting out an unspecified number of dates on their European tour to care for his wife, who is currently suffering from undisclosed health issues.
Then, mere hours later, Slipknot announced that longtime keyboardist and samplist Craig Jones had left the band, a short but polite statement being pushed out across the 'Knot's social media channels. Then, very soon after that, the announcement of Jones' departure was deleted, replaced with a startling image of a mysterious, unidentified masked man, believed to be Jones' replacement in the band (a theory quickly confirmed as Slipknot played the first date of their European tour in Austria that evening). Put frankly: no one seemed to know what the hell was going on.
