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Moving to Huntington Beach in ‘93 to join future bandmates - James “Munky” Shaffer, Reginald “Fieldy” Arvizu, Brian “Head” Welch, and David Silveria in the band Creep, Davis left the security of home. That’s where the real story begins.
Creep became KORN and success began with the buzz of a new SoCal sound, fashion, and spokesperson for troubled youth after the death of Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain in ‘94. Many young fans looked to Davis to take up the torch after Cobain’s tragic demise.
“I didn’t want to be that person,” he said. “I was medicated - a lot.”
Feeling the weight, KORN achieved multi-platinum success, due in part to their masterful marketing plan keeping fans in the mix.
“We embraced it early on [1996],” said Davis of the band’s early use of technology to reach the world. “We were the first band to do a live webcast of any kind. We got featured in TIME magazine, and used early Quicktime video technology so fans could look at us in the studio. I knew it was going to be the new thing, so we just kept on doing it.”
And still does.
At his new official website -
www.jdsfa.com - visitors are greeted by a video of Davis, as well as a real-time video stream from inside the singer’s home studio.
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With a growing number of solo projects added to his impressive résumé - including 2002’s “Queen of The Damned” soundtrack, the Twilight Zone revival TV-series, among others, Davis’ creative associations have also evolved.
Former Oingo Boingo keyboardist Richard Gibbs and Davis worked on QOTD together, becoming close friends and colleagues during the learning process.
“Richard’s an amazing guy, he’s taught me so much and took me under his wing,” he said of Gibbs. “When you’re doing a score you’re painting an emotional picture of what’s going on. They hired us to do QOTD even before they shot the movie! We got the songs done and they shot the movie around the songs.”
Although the movie was a minor hit, the project was both a milestone for Davis, and a sad reminder of the short life of R&B singer Aaliyah Haughton who played the lead in the film. The movie was released six months after her tragic death in a plane crash over the Bahamas. Despite his relation to the movie, Davis never got a chance to speak to the actress throughout filming.
“We had to talk ‘through’ people because we were going to work together,” he remembered. “When she passed, her brother Rashad came and lived with me for about four months to help him get over it, so I got close to the family. It was just devastating.”
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