Sunday, August 19, 2012

Forgot All About You

On Friday, Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst announced that the band had retired, to which most of the world replied, "Who?" Since it is no longer 2001, many people required a refresher course as to why the punk/hip-hop band was popular in the first place. (Honestly, I can't even tell you. I chalk it up to us being young and confused.) Still, this reminded me of why I usually laugh when actors and musicians tell us they are retiring. Unlike sports, where athletes are forced into retirement way before they would like, most entertainers can tour or continue to get roles until they are dead. It doesn't matter if they were a one-hit wonder, as long as there is one fan willing to buy a ticket and they are willing to swallow their pride they can keep chugging along. So, musicians don't retire - society retires them. Most of the time we simply decide we don't want to hear from them anymore and stop paying attention. Only about 10 acts in history have ever announced a retirement which generally bummed out their fans who wanted them to keep touring. The rest of them announce they are quitting entertainment in a tone similar to the person at work who responds to being fired by screaming, "You can't fire me because I quit!"

The timing of this was particularly odd because I swear I just saw a commercial for a pay-per-view Limp Bizkit concert a couple weeks ago. I can only assume the number of sales were very low and this prompted Durst to announce the band's retirement as a litmus test to see how outraged their fans became. Considering the announcement was mostly met with jokes on the internet about how people had thought it already happened, I can't see this inspiring the band to regroup for a new album. Now, it is entirely possible that the band will reform at some later date, because musicians always try to squeeze out every last dollar with a reunion tour, usually after a hearing in bankruptcy court. But for now we will take the boys at their word that this is it and give them a musical interlude send-off. I picked the best Limp Bizkit song which, ironically, wasn't ever on a Limp Bizkit album - it's from the soundtrack to an awful movie called "End of Days". Seems strangely appropriate.

2 comments:

Liz said...

Hahaha, Limp Bizkit. Reminds me so much of Framingham State, it's scary.
Also, I liked 'Take A Look Around' a lot.

Tom said...

I picked this song specifically because of the memory of you, me and Allie at Newbury Comics where you became particularly unimpressed with a store clerk who didn't know what album this song was on and had no great desire to look it up.