I received a frantic text from my brother Lars Wettner today. "Whoa why is Lars taking a break from drumming to text me? I thought as I read it.

"Did you hear that Corey Taylor of Slipknot might be the new lead singer of Velvet Revolver?"

Now I have to preface this with Lars Wettner is a huge fan of Stone Sour. He is the only man I know who bought their albums and listens to them almost as much as he listens to Godsmack, The Sword, and Metallica. In Corey's moment of sadness when they lost Chad Gray due to drugs, Lars Wettner wanted to cuddle up with Corey Taylor and stroke his hair and tell him that everything was going to be ok while reading him Goodnight Moon.

I went back through some public quotes from Matt Sorum and Slash about the purported mysterious Velvet Revolver singer and culled the following:

Here is what Slash had to say about the guy:

"We're gonna have a whole different personality as a vocalist. It's gonna be a lot heavier than anything Velvet Revolver has done so far. 'Cause that was the only thing missing for me — the sort or heaviness of it — in the first two Velvet Revolver records."

That tells me only that the person has a harder background. Sebastian Bach, Chris Jericho, Tim Ripper Owens all come to mind before Corey Taylor. In fact, Tim Ripper Owens is a great fit. He was in Judas Priest and Iced Earth both have a different personality than the bluesy lounge act of Scott Weiland.

I turned to Matt Sorum for guidance:

[The] guy we're liking right now is a known guy," he said. "He's a guy we've had our eye on, but the timing wasn't right. [He's] a little younger, a little stronger, a bit heavier rock 'n' roll than we are, that's all I can say."

Well that may eliminate Tim Owens because I am not sure how many people KNOW Tim Ripper Owens. It could be Bach as he traditionally tried out of Velvet Revolver back in the day, but something tells me that would strain his relationship with Axl Rose.

Perhaps the damning piece of evidence is Perla Hudson's ,Slash's wife, own Twitter account where she stated that they were having dinner with Mr. Corey and there seems to be a lot of that recently.

Fans eagerly awaiting this announcement might not have to wait too long as the announcement is supposed to come in January. But could it really be Corey Taylor?

He will be touring with Avenged Sevenfold, The Hollywood Undead, and Stone Sour throughout January and February as part of the Nightmare After Christmas tour. I think it would detract from the tour to announce he's with Velvet Revolver.

Then there are gigs planned for late spring early summer for Slipknot where at NAMM Corey Taylor talks about not having a touring bassist seen on stage.

"It's one of the things that we're talking about right now,"

Joey Jordinson elaborates on the quote saying:

"We're not gonna have anyone on stage right now," Jordison said. "The bass player, he'll be behind me, you know, when I'm playing to lock in with me, but there's no one right now to go onstage. There's no replacement for Paul right now."

So...when in that time frame would Corey Taylor actually get to play/tour with Velvet Revolver? If they announce it in January, it wouldn't be until the fall at the earliest when we would see/hear new Velvet Revolver. Also the dominating questions during those tours would be about Velvet Revolver and their plans and not on Stone Sour or Slipknot.

Something has to give. If the singer is Corey Taylor the announcement can't be in January. If the announcement is in January, it can't be Corey Taylor.

Personally, I believe it is a huge joke at this point similar to Chinese Democracy. It is one of those questions journalists want to be the first to break so they continue to ask the members of VR who their new lead singer is keeping the band alive. Then Matt and Slash keep it alive as a joke to see how long it can go without people figuring out their is no Holy Grail or lead singer of VR.

Besides, I just talked to Dave Kushner at Marshall's Home Goods and he said he doesn't know anything about an album, a new lead singer, or Velvet Revolver plans at all.