Limp Bizkit
Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water

THE REVIEW

20 years ago, that crap (in my opinion) Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water was released, which, from the title alone, foreshadowed a triumph of sounds capable of capturing the masses increasingly interested in the Nu-Metal phenomenon at the time. That's how it went, except that the interested masses consisted of a bunch of nitwits of the worst kind, and more importantly, Nu-Metal wasn't talked about (and perhaps never has been) much anymore. Limp Bizkit did create the only album (their debut) classifiable as Rap-Metal (excluding, of course, the entire Bio-Hazard discography), but otherwise, we ended up in the horrible melting pot of crossover... Nu-Metal was never their thing. As I said before, the masses were attracted simply because Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water is a record that, to be understood (better not to dwell on the lyrics), you only need to be 12 years old with an empty head. I myself (even today) have never dared to read the lyrics because (as one might guess) they are of RARE ignorance, I've always conceived it as a party album. The mood for listening is this: we are all together and want something that makes us party without actually understanding what is happening... something carefree, something IGNORANT!

If we then want to discuss the songs, I can say that: Hot Dog could have been sssssizzling except that Fred Durst repeats the word FUCK a whopping 48 (AND I SAY 48) times, causing discomfort. My Generation (especially live) is the right cover to unleash chaos and not understand anything; Wes Borland's riff, despite its lack of complexity, drives the track in an apt way, and DJ Lethal's scratch before the final chorus remains legendary for me. Unfortunately, Durst will ruin everything with his absolutely gratuitous fucks & pieces of shit. Livin It Up, if you take only the guitar, would be a good start to experiment with a groove-metal track with futuristic sounds, but IT IS NOT SO. The famous Rollin (a track that made a splash) is one of the most useless and empty songs (suitable for such an album) ever conceived. Full Nelson (a term now in pornographic slang) with its avalanche of obscenities is supposed to mimic (in terms of sound) Stuck and Counterfeit (first album) almost entirely failing. Boiler is the strongest piece of this crappy album; it's no coincidence it was chosen by the fans despite Durst and his megalomaniac nonsense. Take a Look Around, on the other hand, is part of the great classics of the genre; it's a piece (I regret to say) impeccable in every respect and rightly ascended to the top of the charts. To conclude, I want to mention It’ll be ok, a track with a very slow mood (unknown to many and very appreciated by me) which, in the closing riff, unleashes in me a sensation difficult to describe... I just know it's pleasant.

To close the discussion, I say that Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water is such a megalomaniac album that it ends up being decidedly HARMLESS. I don't recommend it to ANYONE unless you want to feel like empty pumpkins or simply want to listen to what could have been the first “””””trap””””” album (trap because it's empty and useless) of 2000.