Rick Astley is best known for his hit “Never Gonna Give You Up” (and “Rickrolling,” obviously), but he also has a bit of an affinity for metal.
Astley has been getting a lot of attention as of late for his TikTok video of him jamming out on the guitar to Slipknot’s “Duality.” (Note: One of the hashtags in the clip is #RickTok, because of course.)
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As for his Slipknot fandom, Astley tells Metal Hammer, “This is a bit of a weird one, because obviously a lot of people’s perception of Slipknot if you’re not really aware of them is ‘Oh, it’s those guys who wear the masks, which is very, very true; that is a lot about what they’re about, their identities being hidden all these years and all the rest of it – even though we kind of know what the singer Corey [Taylor] looks like. Or I do anyway, because I’ve seen stuff of him on YouTube going out doing his acoustic gigs and all the rest of it, which is a bit weird after all these years.”
Astley continues, “The thing with them is they actually write really great melodies, it’s just sometimes the thing that comes out for a lot of people who aren’t into [metal] – and it’s not my genre, I’m not saying that – but I’m saying of various things that I’ve looked at that they’ve done on YouTube and what have you, this one just stands out to me as being a great song. They’re quite unconventional [in] the way they write songs sometimes, but [‘Duality’ is] just a brilliant track. When I’m in my room thrashing about on my drum kit with my headphones on, it’s one of the tracks I like to play. I forget what their drummer’s called, but he’s just a ridiculous drummer as well.”
So, what did we learn today? Even if you’re not that into metal, there’s likely something within the genre that even the most unlikely of people will enjoy.