Limp Bizkit were once one of the most polarizing bands on the planet. At the height of their fame in the late 1990s and early 2000s, they were selling millions of albums and topping MTV’s Total Request Live countdown, yet were dismissed and even lambasted by skeptics and music critics.
Eventually, their fanbase dwindled as nu-metal’s popularity waned, but in recent years, both the band and the once-maligned genre have experienced a rebirth that sees Limp Bizkit headlining major rock festivals as they recapture old fans and make new ones along the way.
Heavy Consequence recently caught up with Limp Bizkit guitarist Wes Borland to discuss his new signature Jackson King V KV guitar, but we couldn’t let him go without asking about the band’s recent resurgence after years of backlash.
“What a great question,” responded Borland, “How bizarre has this been? This has obviously come up before in the last few years ’cause we’ve been talking about it. And my wife just usually goes, ‘I think it’s like you guys just are having fun finally. And people can see that. You don’t take yourselves too seriously.”
He continued, “She goes, ‘You’re all really good musicians, and you kinda have been through the ringer, and now you’re just having fun with it, not taking things too seriously.” So maybe that’s it. There was a time where we had a lot of inner turmoil in the band and conflict, and I think people can tell that that’s happening from the outside. I feel like our fans were, like, ‘Ugh… some dark shit is going on.”
He went on to say, “Besides the tragedy of losing [bassist] Sam [Rivers], what else terrible can happen? We’ve already been through all of it.”
The last few years have seen Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst dressing up as goofy characters onstage, while Borland continues to wear out-of-this-world costumes. The band even poked fun at the past backlash by naming their 2021 comeback album Still Sucks.
That carefree attitude appears to be rubbing off on Limp Bizkit’s former naysayers, with Borland noting, “When people stop taking things so seriously and just relax a little bit, get a little older, realize how lucky we are to be here, you just go, ‘Oh, I don’t care about this stigma so much. I like this band.’ Instead of going, ‘Oh, I have something to prove. I’m tough. I don’t like this ’cause you don’t like this.'”
He concluded, “I think people can tell that we’re having fun with it again, or maybe finally having fun with it. ‘Cause in the early days, I don’t know how much fun we were having.”
