During the years he was away from Korn, Welch released Christian music as a solo artist and later rebranded under the name Love and Death, a Christian band that included members of Spoken, Red, Breaking Benjamin, and Phinehas.
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Welch’s journey back to Korn began at a music festival where he unexpectedly joined Korn onstage for a song. “So many people broke down in tears, and it was like God was right there manifesting,” Welch said. “Because he’s definitely a God of family and reconciliation.”
“I didn’t know what it meant,” Welch said, sharing that he declined when the band asked him to rejoin. “I declined because I didn’t think that was my deal. I just didn’t have that desire,” he said.
There are two sides to Korn, Welch explained: the “hard life of touring and traveling so much” and the “easy side where there’s fans at every single show—and you’ve got a successful career.”
“So I thought from biblically reading stuff that I was okay with the struggle. I didn’t need everything perfect,” he said.
Although Welch declined Korn’s offer, he couldn’t get it out of his mind. For the next three weeks, Welch recalled, “I just felt so close to God.”
“I feel like during those three weeks, [God] started breaking off religious mindsets and showing me that he wasn’t afraid to leave the perfection and holiness of heaven to come down to a very dark place with a lot of corruption,” Welch said.
He continued,
He just was showing me, don’t be afraid to be a light and dark. And he revealed to me through myself, through my own heart, and then through people I trusted in leadership, that he never meant for me to never go back [to Korn]. He just meant it wasn’t the right time. He started to reveal through counsel that the time was now. And so that’s what led to [me rejoining Korn].
“But I did not go running back,” Welch emphasized. “I declined. That’s a big train to be on.” Initially, not everyone Welch counseled thought he should return to the band.
“That’s what a relationship is with God. I went to God and I said, ‘I need three people and they all have to agree.’ And then two of them did. One didn’t. And I said in relationship, ‘I really needed the three. Lord, I can’t do it. It’s only two,’” Welch said. “And then on my birthday, he comes and says [he has peace about it].”
