This came out in 2003 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
“I’m underneath the gun,” admits Fred Durst — and once you get past his typically hamfisted phraseology, he’s got a helluva point.
It’s been a pretty lousy few years for Limp Bizkit. The guitarist who supplied most of their personality and much of their musical originality up and quit. It took them ages to find a new one. They reportedly recorded and scrapped two full albums of material before settling on this long-delayed effort, which has been through almost as many name changes as Roseanne. To add insult to injury, fans have started to boo them on tour. And Durst become even more of a laughingstock over his public tryst and nasty breakup with Britney Spears. Wih all that stacked up against him, even a lunkhead like Fred can see that Results May Vary is nothing short of a make-or-break album.
Well, Freddy better call up all the king’s horses and all the king’s men, ’cause this disc ain’t gonna put his career back together again. Flaccid, banal, uninspired, hamfisted and just plain lousy, Results May Vary is not only the biggest crapfest Durst and Bizkit have issued, but easily one of the sorriest major-label albums of the year.
Anyone looking for the searing detuned guitars, neck-snapping hip-hop rhythms and upside-your-head rap-rock rage of Break Stuff will find them in short supply here — just a couple of heavy-hitting cuts to open the disc (and fool listening-post patrons into purchasing) and a couple more on the back half. It’s what’s between them, though, that’s the real problem. In a turnaround that almost amounts to a betrayal of his genre, his past and his audience, Durst leads his once-powerful band down the mellow brick road for most of this 68-minute snoozefest, presenting enervated, low-impact grooves that would be too soft even for the latter-day Red Hot Chili Peppers. With their dark ’n’ smoky ambience, gently funky beats and beefy crooning, several of these tracks sound like rejects from a Staind album.
That’s nothing compared to his lyrics. Never Durst’s strongest suit, they have never been more laughably inept. He whines about being bullied in high school. He talks about crying himself to sleep. He whines about having his heart broken — perhaps by Britney, a notion made even more pathetic by the fact that they were together for like, what, a week? And it gets worse: On The Only One, the guy who did it all for the nookie, the nookie, does a 180° and preaches (get this) abstinence — yeah, that oughta go over big with his fan base. I’m not going to dwell on his inability to create anything beyond repetitive schoolyard rhymes (“Learned how to rap as a little boy / Took a lot of crap as a little boy”), his nonexistent flow, his glaring plagiarism of other artists and his tasteless namedropping (“Ease your pain / Like a melody from Kurt Cobain”). But you cannot ignore his atrocious cover of The Who’s Behind Blue Eyes — which, tellingly, omits the rockin’ middle part — or the fact that Pete Townshend’s name is misspelled in the credits. For a celebrity ass-kisser, this isn’t just stupid, it’s sacrilege. Betcha somebody’s personal assistant is looking for a new job next week.
Ultimately, after suffering through the wet noodle that is Results May Vary, it’s hard to know what the hell Durst is after here. Credibility? Respect? Sympathy? Whatever it is, he’s more likely to get what he’s earned — scorn, disdain and abuse. But I doubt that’s going to come as a surprise. Even Fred seems to be able to read the writing on the wall: “My life is one big dream,” he says. “These voice is my mind keep telling me it’s time to wake me up ’cuz it’s almost over.”
And once you get past his typically hamfisted phraseology, he’s got a helluva point.
