MINUS MUNKY ON GUITAR, KORN STARTS TOUR WITH LUZIER ON DRUMS

Although guitarist James ‘Munky’ Schaffer has withdrawn from Korn’s European tour, the band has chosen Ray Luzier as their drummer.

Korn have officially started their European tour and the band has announced the lead guitarist, James “Munky” Shaffer has left the band’s for both personal and family reasons. Lead vocalist Jonathan Davis released this response on the bands website “We fully support Munky’s need to be home right now and because we want to come through for all of our European fans, the tour will go on. It’s what Munky wants us to do, too. We promise to give it our all every night!.”

Although there is no definitive word on whether Munky will rejoin the band on tour, the show must go on and Korn have also announced drummer Ray Luzier, formerly of Army of Anyone and David Lee Roth as their touring drummer for 2008. For the majority of 2007, Slipknot’s Joey Jordison took over the drumming duties for the band before going back to the studio to work on Slipknot’s upcoming studio album. We caught up with Ray Luzier just before departing with the band on their European leg of the tour to get his thoughts on being approached by Jonathan Davis to be a part of Korn.

“Yeah, I’m the new drummer for Korn now. We start in Dublin, Ireland on the 13th of this month and we have a big world tour coming up right now. We’re going everywhere, all over the U.K. and we’re going to go to Dubai, South Africa, Russia. It’s a crazy tour.”

Luzier even admitted he was honored to be asked to join the band, since he’s been a big fan of Korn for a long time and an even bigger fan of drummer Terry Bozzio, who worked with Korn on their latest studio effort.

“I was very, very impressed when they approached me and called me about the gig. I’m a huge Korn fan from way back, especially after Bozzio did the record. I like him so much. So, it’s a great honor to be in this band and be a part of the legacy because they’re one of the best bands out there.”

Korn’s tour concludes March 24th in Cape Town South Africa and the band has dates planned in Russia and Dubai along with most of Europe. The band will then decide whether to get back into the studio or perhaps book a North American Family Values Tour for the Summer of 2008.