Fred Durst is standing with his hand on the detonator, counting down to oblivion. It’s May 1999, and MTV have invited Limp Bizkit to the Bahamas for Blow The Boat: Isle Of MTV Summer Launch, a televised summer moshfest with two express goals: firstly, to showcase two new tracks – I’m Broke and Nookie – from the band’s soon-to-be- released second album, Significant Other, and secondly, to... well, blow up a boat.
Looking back now, the correlation between the two is anyone’s guess, but as Fred pushes down the plunger that detonates the explosives packed into the small sailboat moored a few hundred yards away, sending stern and bow rocketing sky-high in an inferno of flames, the symbolism is hard to miss. Over the previous few years, nu metal had become the dominant sound within the metal scene thanks to the likes of Korn, Deftones and Coal Chamber and Limp Bizkit themselves, but, like the boat that Fred Durst has just blown up, it’s about to explode everywhere.
