Fuck Wes Borland, and fuck everyone who supported this lying sack of shit.

Click to read more…

Is Twitter the new Facebook (if Facebook was, in fact, the new MySpace)? MetalSucks isn’t gonna wait to find out, and has now officially joined 2008 by signing up for Twitter (follow us!). In case you’re over the age of 20 and not yet hip to Twitter, Twitter is a social networking site that’s basically just the “status update” section of Facebook with everything else stripped away. Users can update their profiles with short messages and links with quick updates about what they’re currently doing (140 characters or less), from a web interface or from their mobile phone. Musicians have begun dabbling in the world of Twitter, and, naturally, this provides loads of entertainment for us.

Aside from the obvious humor inherent in a bunch of br00tal metal dudes doing something that’s called a “Tweet,” some notable metal musicians are already ensconced in the world of Twitter. And what’s cool about it is that you know, at least until marketing department heads become hip to it, that you’re getting a direct link to the actual person. When Vernon Reid Tweets about the guy that designed his custom pedalboard, you know it’s him. When Fred Durst Tweets about a tattoo of Frankenstein he’s getting… uh, you know it’s him, for better or worse. Let’s look at what some notable quotables in the metal world are saying on Twitter:

Click to read more…

I had the displeasure of seeing Dope live once (don’t ask). They were playing at Don Hill’s, a club here in NYC that holds about 300 people, and, to my surprise, they actually managed to pack the place pretty full. So after the band before them concluded their set, Dope kept the crowd waiting for 45 minutes while their roadies set up elaborate stage dressing fit for an arena show: extra platforms and a new PA system and lighting rig (I guess the house systems weren’t good enough for the band) and giant wooden backdrops and a chain link fence (!) and who the fuck knows what else. This kind of shit really isn’t necessary for a small club gig, but it might have been forgivable had the band come out and rocked the kids’ faces off; instead, they came out and played for… 45 minutes. To repeat: the band played for as long as they kept the crowd waiting for them to play. In hindsight, it seems clear that all the rigmarole was really because without the fancy lights and props, the band knew they didn’t have much to offer.

I’m telling you this story because Dope will be opening for Black Label Society and Sevendust on their upcoming tour, which still strikes me as an odd package – that Zakk Wylde, who once proclaimed “Fred Durst can eat a dick” on his band’s DVD, would share a stage with not one but two nu-metal bands just seems weird.

Weirder still: Wylde has now recorded a track with Dope. Let me type that again, lest you think your eyes are failing you: DOPE HAVE A SONG ON THEIR NEW ALBUM WITH ZAKK WYLDE ON GUITAR.

Click to read more…

Fred Durst’s first foray into the world of feature film making, The Education of Charlie Banks, played the Tribeca Film Festival here in NY to surprisingly strong reviews, but never got a theatrical (or even straight to DVD or cable) release. After The Longshots, Durst’s follow-up, opened to bad reviews and worse box office numbers this past summer, I kind of assumed Banks would never get a theatrical release. Looks like I was wrong: Anchor Bay will release the movie in theaters on March 27.

I know that certain long time readers think I rag on Durst too much, so I’m not gonna say anything about this. The poster is above, and if you’re interested, the trailer is after the jump. Enjoy. Or don’t. Whatever.

Click to read more…

“And the fifth angel blew his trumpet. And I saw a star that had fallen from heaven to the earth, and the key of the pit of the abyss was given him. And he opened the pit of the abyss, and smoke ascended out of the pit as the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun was darkened, also the air, by the smoke of the pit. And out of the smoke Limp Bizkit reunited and came forth upon the earth; and authority was given them, the same authority as the scorpions of the earth have.

“And in those days the men will seek death but will by no means find it, and they will desire to die but death keeps fleeing from them.”

Revelations 9:1-6

Ladies and gentlemen, Limp Bizkit have reunited.

Click to read more…

Apparently, some of you think I’ve been too mean to Fred Durst.

Well, some of you should feel free to find another blog to read.

ANYWAY, The Longshots, the first film Durst has directed that has actually gotten a release, debuted at number seven at the box-office in its opening weekend, opening on 2,089 screens and making a little over $4 million dollars with a per-screen average $2,606. That might sound like a lot of money, but in the film business, for a studio movie like this, aimed at families and starring a proven box-office star in the genre, it ain’t good. Not by a, um, longshot.

Click to read more…

The Limp Bizkit flow masta’s cinematic opus The Longshots opens today, and, as you can see, it’s getting rave reviews in the press:

Click to read more…

Marilyn Manson was always one of the most staunch anti-Limp Bizkit activists during that band’s heyday – so the announcement that Bizkit guitarist Wes Borland is joining his band seems kind of odd.

Luckily, Manson, ever the clever media manipulator, managed to do some damage control with this kind of hilarious statement:

Click to read more…

Fred Durst is really taking this whole “looking like a disheveled film director” thing quite seriously, right down to the trashy almost-skullet and ’80s computer-nerd glasses. And then there’s the Slayer shirt, as if his wardrobe selection could possibly make up for years of terrible music. Sorry, Freddy. No can do.

These overdubbed YouTube clips still haven’t stopped being funny. [via Idolator]

-VN

Pop quiz. Fred Durst was hired to direct the Ice Cube vehicle The Longshots for which of the following reasons?

A) His understanding of African American life in modern society.

B) His incredible empathy for young girls everywhere.

C) His own personal knowledge of what it’s like to cross boundaries and achieve unthinkable goals against incredible odds when no one believed in you.

D) The guy who directed The Game Plan passed.

E) All of the above.

Ladies and gentlemen, without further delay, I give you the theatrical trailer for Fred Durst’s Ice Cube’s The Longshots, in theaters July 25:

By the way, Durst’s directorial debut, The Education of Charlie Banks, played here in NYC at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival – and it still has no release date (theatrical or otherwise) set in the U.S. or anywhere else in the world. Also, word around the campfire is that Durst was fired off The Longshots before production was completed. So, in other words, Durst’s film career is going really, really well.

-AR

I mean, really. The above headline is so unfair. Lots of perfectly respectable metal musicians give lessons when they’re not touring ’cause it’s a good way to make some extra money.

Of course, those musicians tend to be talented, hard working, blue collar dudes in real metal bands. And, also, y’know, musicians.

And none of those words describe John Otto, the Limp Bizkit* skinsman/resident hobbit who is now offering drum lessons for $150-$200 a pop (depending on if you want a little alone time with him or don’t mind sharing him with someone else who thought that “Rollin’” was a good song). Having never taken a drum lesson, I have no idea if that’s a fair price or not, but if I were gonna take a drum lesson and it was gonna cost me $200, I would probably want it to be with Dave Lombardo or Gene Hoglan or Paul Bostaph or Kevin Talley or Jiminy fuckin’ Cricket, or at least, like, David Silvera.

Anyways, you can get more info here. Please book something soon and help Mr. Otto get his Ferrari out of the shop – Fred and Wes tell him the LB reunion is still at least a year off and he really, really needs that car to get laid.

-AR

*Frodo – uh, that is, Otto – is apparently also in a band called The Killer and the Star, but I think even fewer people have heard of them than have heard of Black Light Burns.

So I went to the premiere of the new Tina Fey-Amy Poehler vehicle Baby Mama last night (don’t ask). It wouldn’t really be an event worth talking about, except that when I got to the swanky after-party, who did I find myself standing next to but one Mr. Frederick Durst.

Once I got past the shock that, yes, he really does look that bad these days (even when in a suit instead of whatever he rolled out of bed with), I found myself facing a series of choices for how to best proceed:

• Should I kick him in the nuts?
• Should I ask if he wants to do an on-the-spot interview and then ask him why he sucks so bad?
• Should I give him my business card (yes, we do have business cards here at the MetalSucks mansion)?
• Should I do and say absolutely nothing?

Ultimately, I chose the fourth and final option. Why? Well, kicking him in the nuts or insulting him seemed like a surefire way to get myself kicked out of the party, and the lil’ lady and I wanted to see if we could seduce Tina Fey into a three way (the answer, in case you’re curious, is “no,” although Chevy Chase told us he was down for anything so long as he could whistle that “Holiday Roads” song the whole time). Ditto for giving him my card; it’s unlikely Durst knows MetalSucks or is in any way aware of the not-so-complimentary things we’ve said about him in the past, but if, by some off chance, he took my card and then looked at the site, well, I didn’t want him having my cell phone number. ‘Cause he seems like the kind of cat who would just crank call you from now until the end of time.

By the way, he had a relatively attractive woman with him. Good to know that being famous a decade ago still gets the dude laid.

-AR

From Perez Hilton by way of MetalSucks reader Shawn McNamara…

Why the fucking fuck fuck is Albert fucking Einstein fucking tattooed on his motherfucking leg?

-AR

Sonny Mayo’s sudden expulsion from Sevendust makes me worried that Snot might reunite – I mean, fuck, it almost happened once already just about a year ago.

For those of you lucky enough not to be familiar with Snot, they’re a band that holds a legendary place in the minds of kids who actually like nu metal, since they were poised to join Limp Bizkit as one of their generation’s most annoying bands when front man Lynn Strait died in a car accident in 1998 (I’m not speaking ill of the dead, mind you; I’m just speaking ill of the dead’s shitty music). After Snot disbanded, its various members went on to such craptastic acts as Amen, Invitro, Godsmack, and Hed PE. Hell Mayo’s replacement, Mike Smith, even usurped Wes Borland for the one Limp Suckit album that even Fred Durst’s most ardent supporters seem to think sucks.

ANYWAY, in this day and age when bands like Blind Melon aren’t gonna let a little thing like a dead front man stop them from living their rock n’ roll dreams, I would be in no way surprised if some re-jiggered version of this band tried to figure out a way to cash in. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Here’s Snot’s video for “Stoopid.” Apt description if ever there was one.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/6VjJeKoVVM4" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Cute dog, right? Yeah. He died in the car crash, too.

-AR

From the always astute pop-culture critics at Idolator:

Weiland, the estranged singer of Velvet Revolver, has teamed up with members of Army Of Anyone and Bomb Shelter Studios owner Eric Kretz for a tour that will hit more than 50 amphitheaters this summer and fall.

Brilliant. In other news, members of The Haunted, Disfear and Cradle of Filth will be teaming up for a massive world tour this summer. Let’s just pray and hope that film director Fred Durst doesn’t decide to collaborate with Fear and the Nervous System‘s Wes Borland for anything… ever.

-VN

Epicurean vocalist John Laramy (pictured left) has done a guest post for The Deciblog entitled “Top 5 Musical Moments that made the world more dumb.” My personal favorite is #3, “Heavy Metal: 1994 – 2001,” natch:

“In the song ‘Rollin’,’ before bursting into lyrics plagiarized from a Richard Simmons work out tape (‘Breathe in, now breath out, hands up, now hands down’) Fred Durst asks, ‘You know what time it is?’ Indeed I do, it’s about a quarter past: time for the members of Gorgoroth to sodomize you while I enjoy a mug of hot cocoa and a smug sense of satisfaction.”

A man after my own heart.

Read the rest here.

-AR

Normally Pelican is one of the last bands I’d ever accuse of being a nu metal act; but Nick at The Deciblog posted a link to a mash-up of Pelican’s “Dead Between the Walls” and “Pillz” by Gucci Mane* this past Sunday, and while I find the resulting track catchier than I’m comfortable admitting (okay okay okay, so I may have listened it to five or six times in a row last night), it is amazing how adding rap over Pelican’s music suddenly makes it sound remarkably like late 90s/early aughties rap metal. Seriously: check out the bouncy, fat (phat?) riff, the gentle verses that really allowing the “flowing” to, uh, flow, etc., etc.

This raises a series of questions, like: if you put rapping over any band, will it automatically begin to sound like nu/rap/whatever metal? Would Limp Bizkit have been a semi-decent band if not for Fred Durst? Is Axl Rosenberg losing his fucking mind? Discuss amongst yourselves.

-AR

*I also did some homework on this Gucci Mane fellow, with whom I was previously unfamiliar, and have since decided that he is the single most brilliant artist working in hip-hop today. Take the lyrics to the song “Freaky Gurl,” for example: “First you get her name/Then you get her number/Then you get some brain in the front seat of her Hummer.” If that’s not the greatest love poetry of the 21st century so far, then my name isn’t Axl Rosenberg.

I was confused about about the name of this tour because, well, being a “heavy hitter” is usually a euphemism for being “important,” and yet I’d heard of none of the other bands on this tour (Although I liked this description of the tour’s co-headliners: “Kingspade is just straight dope and they possess the freshness of the Kottonmouth Kings, but with a nice hip-hop twist.” First of all, describing a band’s music as “just straight dope” in 2008 is HILARIOUS; second of all, Kottonmouth Kings didn’t already have a “hip-hop twist?” I thought their music was, y’know, hip-hop?).

So I called (Hed) P.E.’s publicist for some clarification. I was hopeful that the band had finally taken my suggestion that they just rent out baseball bats and let “concert goers” beat the living shit out of them – hell, I even offered to buy a ticket that would cost at least as much as a sweet new band hoodie – but, alas, no. It’s just called “Heavy Hitters” because, to white kids who still think that Fred Durst is the future of music and that Kottonmouth Kings need more of a “straight dope hip-hop twist,” this is the tour of the fucking century.

-AR

From Buddyhead:

Give Fred Durst a call on his cell phone at 310 210 0119 and ask him what it’s like to have a teenie weenie. Tell that douche that Buddyhead sent you. By the way, we only know about his tiny unit cuz he made the world look at that peanut when he leaked his weak sex tape. Good move bro! About as good as calling your record Starfish Hotdog Water” or whatever the fuck that was called. While you at it, sign Fred up for every mailing list you can and shoot him an email at fdurst@mac.com asking why there’s not much going on over at http://www.limpbizkit.com/.

If there’s one thing I know every reader of MetalSucks can agree on, its a hatred of Fred Durst / Limp Bizkit. Have fun!

-VN