I came across my first comic book when I was five years old.
It was a crusty, beat-up Spider-Man comic from the seventies; the cover was torn, the spine was a joke, and the pages were so yellow you’d have thought someone was chain-smoking around the thing. It was more pulp than fiction, really. But I was officially hooked. I started reading comics voraciously, even titles I didn’t really understand at the time, like Charlton Comics’ E-Man. I didn’t care—I read them all. From that moment, I was what you call a “comic geek.” Thirty-five years later, nothing has changed.
Then again, maybe a few things have changed. I mean, how many fans get a chance to write his or her own comic? It wasn’t even an option in my manic brain until I started working on the story for House of Gold & Bones, and even that came from me opening my big mouth. “Oh, this would be a great comic book—I wonder if I should pursue this!” Thank God I did open my mouth, because very soon, the first of my four-part miniseries will grace your faces, and I have to be honest, I’m so stoked I can’t stand myself right now. If it weren’t for Dark Horse Comics, it would not have happened at all.
I remember when I first discovered Dark Horse—it was the first twelve-issue series for Aliens vs. Predator and I thought it was one of the coolest titles I’d ever read. I still have them to this day, along with all the subsequent AVP runs. The thing that I loved about Dark Horse was that they could take a concept that cool, give it to the right writers and illustrators, and turn it into magic. And at a time when the other majors (basically the “Big Two”) were doing ridiculous story lines concerning clones and endless reboots that would make even the most basic sense of continuity confusing, I was really glad that there were still companies like Dark Horse who were more into content and quality.
I still read comics to this day, unleashing myself on my buddies’ comic shop whenever I’m not on the road, making their quota with one trip while I’m catching up on the titles I’m behind on. My taste has changed a bit—I tend to follow more writers than I do characters now—but my passion and my love has not wavered in the slightest. It is one of the few things in my life that I cherish from my childhood, and it is one of the only things that I can use to trace my life, forwards and backwards. In the Corey Taylor timeline, there are two significant eras: Before Comics and Comics. I almost put “After Comics,” but that would mean I let them go. That’ll never happen. I’ve managed to pass on my comic craze to my son, so another generation of Taylor will be using up his savings on the adventures of various archetypes on the illustrated page. Sorry, son, but you’re welcome.
So to everyone who picks up the House of Gold & Bones miniseries, I hope you enjoy them and I hope you know they were conceived from a mind that has loved comics since around the time he left diapers for the Big Boy potty. My thanks to Jason Shawn Alexander, Richard P. Clark, and all the other artists who contributed to making my dream come true, from soup to nuts and from concept to inception. Who knows? Maybe these will make a couple of kick-ass movies...
Corey Taylor
(Stone Sour, Slipknot)