Korn deploy seven-string riff mayhem in monstrous new single, Forgotten

After a series of teasers across the band's website and social media over the past week, Korn have dropped Forgotten, the second single and opening track from their forthcoming 14th studio album, Requiem.

Hot on the heels of the record's first single, Start the Healing, Forgotten is similarly varied in dynamics, and features a monolithic seven-string guitar riff and a series of delicately arranged clean arpeggios from James “Munky” Shaffer and Brian “Head” Welch.

The track's accompanying visualizer video was created by EFFIXX, a visual effects artist who worked on the music video for Start the Healing. Check it out below.

Requiem – which arrives February 4 via Loma Vista Recordings – was “conceived out of very different circumstances than the majority of the band's catalogue”. This is due to the ongoing pandemic, which allowed the album to be “born of time and the ability to create without pressure”.

In a recent interview on Loudwire Nights, James “Munky” Shaffer revealed that the new record “has a vibe to it that's like early 2000s”.

“I don't know why,” he confesses. “Maybe it's just because we took more time on guitar. We got a lot of textures, and there's some layering and techniques recording-wise that we've done [such as] recording to tape.”

The guitarist added that due to the “dystopian” nature of the circumstances in which the record was made – “the whole world shut down”, “big fires” in LA – it “might take fans a minute to digest”.

Though bassist Reginald “Fieldy” Arvizu sat out Korn's summer US tour last year in an effort to get “bad habits out of [his] system”, his bass recordings will appear on Requiem. For that tour, the band recruited Suicidal Tendencies bass player Ra Díaz.

Take a look at Requiem's tracklisting below.

1. Forgotten
2. Let the Dark Do the Rest
3. Start the Healing
4. Lost in the Grandeur
5. Disconnect
6. Hopeless and Beaten
7. Penance to Sorrow
8. My Confession
9. Worst Is On Its Way