Former Rage Against The Machine drummer Brad Wilk discussed Tim Commerford trolling Limp Bizkit at the 2000 MTV VMA’s in a recent Let There Be Talk interview. Alternative Nation transcribed his comments.
“We were all sitting there, MTV gave us a bunch of bottles of champagne, Tim obviously was taking it pretty seriously. To be honest, we weren’t fans of Limp Bizkit. The only thing we were fans of is that they were actually getting it together to write music and play, and do things, and we were having a rough time. Anyways, it seemed like in Tim’s eyes that they were going to give us this award, in Tim’s head. So Limp Bizkit wins the award for best video for ‘Break Stuff.’ Michael Moore is sitting right next to us, who made one of the greatest videos. We literally shut down the New York Stock Exchange, an incredible video.”
“So the lesson in life is never expect anything. So Limp Bizkit wins, gets called up, and I remember sitting next to Tim, and Tim sitting next to Michael and he’s like, ‘I wanna fuckin’ go up there.’ He looks over to Michael and goes, ‘I wanna go up there.’ I think other people in the band are like, ‘No, don’t do anything.’ Michael Moore says, ‘Just go with it. Go with your heart.’ Tim is wearing flip flops, and I see Tim get up and start walking over the chairs, and I’m elated at this point because I just love shit like this. I’m like, this is fucking gonna be good, whatever it is, it’s gonna be fucking good.
He actually makes it to the stage, and then starts climbing this tower that starts shaking, and I’m like, ‘This is good, but someone might die now. Someone might get really hurt.’ He’s like shaking this thing, and Fred is looking at him, I’m still in awe, this is fucking amazing. I am standing up like I’m at the greatest sporting event that I’ve ever seen. Meanwhile MTV is trying to divert the attention because the stage is broken up in two parts, so they cut to a commercial. Mayhem ensues, absolute fucking mayhem. We get up out of our seats, and we’re trying to get to Tim.
I remember Tom and I just being in a fucking swarm of fucking people, and it’s almost impossible to get Tim. There’s an undercover cop who went on a ladder to try to get Timmy, I remember watching this vividly. The guy tries to grab at Tim, he’s an undercover cop so he’s in regular clothes, Tim literally grabs the guy’s white fucking mustache and kind of pulls on it. I’m dying, I’m like this is fucking incredible.”
He added, “They finally got him down, and we were all thrown outside. MTV hated us, I remember the head guy at MTV was there as we were being ushered out: ‘Thank you very much, don’t come back.’ That type of thing, I just remember laughing my ass off in the van back to the hotel.”
