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Borland Software Corporation

Type	Subsidiary
Industry	Computer software
Founded	California (1983 (1983))
Headquarters	Austin, Texas
Key people	Erik Prusch - Acting CEO, Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, Mogens Glad, Philippe Kahn - Founders
Products	Borland CaliberRM, Borland SilkCentral Test Manager, Borland SilkTest, Borland SilkPerformer, Borland Gauntlet, Borland StarTeam, Borland Together, Borland Tempo, Borland Caliber DefineIT
Revenue	$172 million USD (2008)[1]
Employees	approximately 1,100[2]
Parent	Micro Focus
Website	borland.com

Borland Software Corporation is a software company first headquartered in Scotts Valley, California, then in Cupertino, California, and finally in Austin, Texas.^[3] It is now a Micro Focus subsidiary. It was founded in 1983 by Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, Mogens Glad and Philippe Kahn.

History[link]

The 1980s: Foundations[link]

Three Danish citizens, Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, and Mogens Glad, founded Borland Ltd. in August 1981 to develop products like Word Index for the CP/M operating system using an off-the-shelf company. However, response to the company's products at the CP/M-82 show in San Francisco showed that a U.S. company would be needed to reach the American market. They met Philippe Kahn, who had just moved to Silicon Valley, and who had been a key developer of the Micral. The three Danes had embarked, at first successfully, on marketing software first from Denmark, and later from Ireland, before running into some challenges at the time when they met Philippe Kahn. The partnership seems to have benefited all involved.^{[citation needed]} Philippe Kahn was at all times Chairman, President, and CEO of Borland Inc. from its inception in 1983 until he left in 1995. Main shareholders at the incorporation of Borland were Niels Jensen (250,000 shares), Ole Henriksen (160,000), Mogens Glad (100,000), and Philippe Kahn (80,000).^{[citation needed]}

Borland successfully launched a series of blockbusters that included Turbo Pascal, SideKick, SuperKey, and Lightning, all developed in Denmark. According to the London IPO filings, the management team was Philippe Kahn as President, Spencer Ozawa as VP of Operations, Marie Bourget as CFO, and Spencer Leyton as VP of business development, while all software development was continuing to take place in Denmark and later London as the Danish co-founders moved there. While the Danes remained majority shareholders, board members included Philippe Kahn, Tim Berry, John Nash, and David Heller. With the assistance of John Nash and David Heller, both British members of the Borland Board, the company was taken public on London's Unlisted Securities Market (USM) in 1986. Schroders was the lead investment banker.

A first US IPO followed in 1989 after Ben Rosen joined the Borland board with Goldman Sachs as the lead banker and a second offering in 1991 with Lazard as the lead banker. All offerings were very successful and over-subscribed.

Borland developed a series of well-regarded software development tools. Its first product was Turbo Pascal in 1983, developed by Anders Hejlsberg (who later developed .NET and C# for Microsoft) and before Borland acquired the product sold in Scandinavia under the name of Compas Pascal. 1984 saw the launch of SideKick, a time organization, notebook, and calculator utility, notable for being a Terminate and Stay Resident (TSR) program.

In 1985 Borland acquired Analytica and its Reflex database product. The engineering team of Analytica, managed by Brad Silverberg and including Reflex co-founder Adam Bosworth, became the core of Borland's engineering team in the USA. Brad Silverberg was VP of engineering until he left in early 1990 to head up the Personal Systems division at Microsoft. Adam Bosworth initiated and headed up the Quattro project until moving to Microsoft later in 1990 to take over the project which eventually became Access.

In 1987 Borland purchased Wizard Systems and incorporated portions of the Wizard C technology into Turbo C. Bob Jervis, the author of Wizard C became a Borland employee. Turbo C was released on May 18, 1987 and an estimated 100,000 copies were shipped in the first month of its release. This apparently drove a wedge between Borland and Niels Jensen and the other members of his team who had been working on a brand new series of compilers at their London development centre. An agreement was reached and they spun off a company called Jensen & Partners International(JPI), later TopSpeed. JPI first launched a MS-DOS compiler named JPI Modula-2, that later became TopSpeed Modula-2, and followed up with TopSpeed C, TopSpeed C++ and TopSpeed Pascal compilers for both the MS-DOS and OS/2 operating systems. The TopSpeed compiler technology exists today as the underlying technology of the Clarion 4GL programming language, a Windows development tool.

In September 1987 Borland purchased Ansa-Software, including their Paradox (version 2.0) database management tool. Richard Schwartz, CEO of Ansa, became Borland's CTO and Ben Rosen joined the Borland board.

The Quattro Pro spreadsheet was launched in 1989 with, at the time, a notable improvement and charting capabilities. Lotus Development, under the leadership of Jim Manzi sued Borland for copyright infringement (see "look and feel"). The litigation, Lotus Dev. Corp. v. Borland Int'l, Inc.,^[4] brought forward Borland's open standards position as opposed to Lotus' closed approach. Borland, under Kahn's leadership took a position of principle and announced that they would defend against Lotus' legal position and "fight for programmer's rights".^{[citation needed]} After a decision in favor of Borland by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, the case went to the United States Supreme Court. Because Justice John Paul Stevens had recused himself, only eight Justices heard the case, and it ended in a 4-4 tie.^[4] As a result, the Fourth Circuit decision remained standing, but the Supreme Court result, being a tie, did not bind any other court and set no national precedent.^[5]

Additionally, Borland was known for its practical and creative approach towards software piracy and intellectual property (IP), introducing its "Borland no-nonsense license agreement". This allowed the developer/user to utilize its products "just like a book"; he or she was allowed to make multiple copies of a program, as long as only one copy was in use at any point in time.

The 1990s: Rise and change[link]

In September 1991 Borland purchased Ashton-Tate, bringing the dBase and InterBase databases to the house, in an all stock transaction. Competition with Microsoft was fierce. Microsoft launched the competing database Microsoft Access and bought the dBase clone FoxPro in 1992, undercutting Borland's prices. During the early 1990s Borland's implementation of C and C++ outsold Microsoft's. Borland survived as a company, but no longer had the dominance in software tools that it once had. It has gone through a radical transition in products, financing, and staff, now a very different company from the one which challenged Microsoft and Lotus in the early 1990s.

The internal problems that arose with the Ashton-Tate merger were a large part of the fall. Ashton-Tate's product portfolio proved to be weak, with no provision for evolution into the GUI environment of Windows. Almost all product lines were discontinued. The consolidation of duplicate support and development offices was costly and disruptive. Worst of all, the highest revenue earner of the combined company was dBASE with no Windows version ready.^[6] Borland had had an internal project to clone dBASE which was intended to run on Windows and was part of the strategy of the acquisition, but by late 1992 this was abandoned due to technical flaws and the company had to constitute a replacement team (the ObjectVision team, redeployed) headed by Bill Turpin to redo the job. Borland lacked the financial strength to project its marketing and move internal resources off other products to shore up the dBASE/W effort. Layoffs occurred in 1993 to keep the company afloat, the third instance of this in five years. By the time dBASE for Windows eventually shipped, the developer community had moved on to other products such as Clipper or FoxBase and dBASE never regained significant share of Ashton-Tate's former market. This happened against the backdrop of the rise in Microsoft's combined Office product marketing.^{[citation needed]}

A change in market conditions also contributed to Borland's fall from prominence. In the 1980s, companies had few people who understood the growing personal computer phenomenon, and so most technical people were given free rein to purchase whatever software they thought they needed. Borland had done an excellent job marketing to those with a highly technical bent. By the mid-1990s, however, companies were beginning to ask what the return was on the investment they had made in this loosely controlled PC software buying spree. Company executives were starting to ask questions that were hard for technical folks to answer, and so corporate standards began to be created. This required new kinds of marketing and support materials from software vendors, but Borland remained focused on the technical side of its products.

During 1993 Borland explored ties with WordPerfect as a possible way to form a suite of programs to rival Microsoft's nascent integration strategy. WordPerfect itself was struggling with a late and troubled transition to Windows. The eventual joint company effort, named Borland Office for Windows (a combination of the WordPerfect word processor, Quattro Pro spreadsheet and Paradox database) was introduced at the 1993 Comdex computer show. Borland Office never made significant in-roads against Microsoft Office. WordPerfect was then bought by Novell. In October 1994, Borland sold Quattro Pro and Paradox to Novell for $140 million in cash,^{[dubious – discuss]} repositioning the company on its core software development tools and the Interbase database engine and shifting toward client-server scenarios in corporate applications. This later proved a good foundation for the shift to web development tools.

Philippe Kahn and the Borland board came to a disagreement on how to focus the company, and Philippe Kahn resigned as Chairman, CEO and President of Borland, a position he had held for 12 years, in January 1995. However, the parting was amicable as Kahn remained on the Borland board until November 7, 1996, when he resigned from that position.^[7] Borland named Gary Wetsel as CEO, but he resigned in July 1996. William F. Miller was interim CEO until September of that year, when Whitney G. Lynn became interim president and CEO and then continued to have a succession of CEOs including Dale Fuller and Tod Nielsen.

The Delphi 1 rapid application development (RAD) environment was launched in 1995, under the leadership of Anders Hejlsberg.

In 1996 Borland acquired Open Environment Corp (OEC),^[8] a Cambridge based company founded by John J. Donovan.^[9]

The Inprise years, and name changes[link]

On November 25, 1996, Del Yocam was hired as Borland CEO and Chairman.

In 1997, Borland sold Paradox to Corel,^{[dubious – discuss]} but—importantly—retained all development rights for the core BDE. In November 1997, Borland acquired Visigenic, a middleware company that was focused on implementations of CORBA.

On April 29, 1998, Borland refocused its efforts on targeting enterprise applications development. Borland hired marketing firm Lexicon Branding to come up with a new name for the company. Borland CEO Del Yocam explained at the time that the new name, Inprise, was meant to evoke "integrating the enterprise".^[10] The idea was to integrate Borland's tools, Delphi, C++ Builder, and JBuilder with enterprise environment software, including Visigenic's implementations of CORBA, Visibroker for C++ and Java, and the new emerging product, Application Server.

For a number of years (both before and during the Inprise name) Borland suffered from serious financial losses and very poor public image. When the name was changed to Inprise, many thought Borland had gone out of business. In March 1999, dBase was sold to KSoft, Inc. which was soon renamed to dBASE Inc. (In 2004 dBASE Inc. was renamed to dataBased Intelligence, Inc.).

In 1999, in the middle of Borland's identity crisis, Dale L. Fuller replaced Yocam. At this time Fuller's title was "interim president and CEO." The "interim" was dropped in December 2000. Keith Gottfried served in senior executive positions with the company from 2000 to 2004.

A proposed merger between Inprise and Corel was announced in February 2000, aimed at producing Linux based products. The scheme was abandoned when Corel's shares fell and it became clear that there was really no strategic fit.

InterBase 6.0 was made available as an open source product in July 2000.

Later Borland years[link]

In January 2001, the Inprise name was abandoned and the company became "Borland" once more.

Under the Borland name and a new management team headed by President and CEO Dale L. Fuller, a now-smaller and profitable Borland refocused on Delphi, and created a version of Delphi and C++ Builder for Linux, both under the name Kylix. This brought Borland's expertise in Integrated Development Environments to the Linux platform for the first time. Kylix was launched in 2001.

Plans to spin off the InterBase division as a separate company were abandoned after Borland and the people who were to run the new company could not agree on terms for the separation. Borland stopped open source releases of InterBase and has developed and sold new versions at a fast pace.

Delphi 6 became the first Integrated Development Environment to support web services. All of the company's development platforms now support web services.

C#Builder was released in 2003 as a native C# development tool, competing with Visual Studio .NET. As of the 2005 release, C#Builder, Delphi for Win32, and Delphi for .NET have been combined into a single IDE called "Borland Developer Studio" (though the combined IDE is still popularly known as "Delphi"). In late 2002 Borland purchased design tool vendor TogetherSoft and tool publisher Starbase, makers of the StarTeam configuration management tool and the CaliberRM requirements management tool. The latest releases of JBuilder and Delphi integrate these tools to give developers a broader set of tools for development.

Former CEO Dale Fuller was fired in July 2005 after a series of financial and commercial blunders, but remained on the board of directors. Former COO Scott Arnold took the title of interim president and chief executive officer until November 8, 2005, when it was announced that Tod Nielsen would take over as CEO effective November 9, 2005. Nielsen remained with the company until January 2009, when he accepted the position of Chief Operating Officer at VMware;^[11] CFO Erik Prusch then took over as Acting President and CEO.^[11]

In October 2005, Borland acquired Legadero, in order to add its IT Management and Governance (ITM&G) suite, called Tempo, to the Borland product line.

On February 8, 2006, Borland announced the divestiture of their IDE division, including Delphi, JBuilder, and InterBase. At the same time they announced the planned acquisition of Segue Software, a maker of software test and quality tools, in order to concentrate on Application Lifecycle Management (ALM). The new spinoff is called CodeGear.

On March 20, 2006, Borland announced its acquisition of Gauntlet Systems, a provider of technology that screens software under development for quality and security.

On November 14, 2006, Borland announced its decision to separate the Developer Tools Group into a wholly owned subsidiary focused on maximizing developer productivity. The newly formed operation, CodeGear, will be responsible for advancing the four primary product lines formerly associated with Borland’s Integrated Development Environment (IDE) business.

In early 2007 Borland rolled out a new company tagline, branding and go to market focus around Open Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) – defining it as the segment of the ALM market in which vendors’ solutions are flexible enough to support a customer’s specific processes, tools and platforms.

In April 2007, Borland announced that it would be relocating its headquarters and R&D facilities to Austin, Texas.^[3] It also has development centers at Singapore, Santa Ana, California, and Linz, Austria.

On May 7, 2008, Borland announced the sale of CodeGear division to Embarcadero Technologies for an expected $23 million price and $7 million in CodeGear accounts receivables retained by Borland.

On May 6, 2009, the company announced it was to be acquired by Micro Focus for $75 million.^[12] The transaction was approved by Borland shareholders on July 22, 2009, with Micro Focus acquiring the company for $1.50/share.^[13] Following Micro Focus shareholder approval and the required corporate filings, the transaction was completed in late July 2009.^[14] The San Jose Mercury News reported that, "Philippe Kahn, who founded the company in 1983 and headed it until 1994, called the deal a 'great fit and synergism for both companies and excellent outcome for employees, customers and shareholders.'"^[15]

Products[link]

Current products[link]

Borland's current product line includes:

• Borland AppServer
• Borland Caliber DefineIT
• Borland CaliberRM
• Borland Enterprise Server
• Borland Enterprise Studio, for C++, Mobile and Java
• Borland Gauntlet
• Borland SilkCentral Test Manager
• Borland SilkPerformer
• Borland SilkTest
• Borland StarTeam
• Borland Tempo
• Borland Together for Eclipse
• Borland VisiBroker

Old software, no longer actively sold by Borland[link]

Programming tools

• Borland C++
• Borland Delphi
• Brief (text editor)
• C++Builder
• C++BuilderX
• C#Builder
• CodeWright
• IntraBuilder
• JBuilder
• Kylix
• ObjectVision
• Turbo Assembler
• Turbo BASIC (now PowerBASIC)
• Turbo C
• Turbo C++
• Turbo Debugger
• Turbo Delphi
• Turbo Modula-2
• Turbo Pascal
• Turbo Pascal Database Toolbox
• Turbo Pascal Editor Toolbox
• Turbo Pascal Graphix Toolbox
• Turbo Pascal Numerical Methods Toolbox
• Turbo Pascal Tutor
• Turbo Profiler
• Turbo Prolog (now Visual Prolog)

Databases

• dBase
• InterBase
• Borland Paradox

Utilities

• SideKick
• SideKick Plus
• SuperKey
• Turbo Lightning (TSR spell checker)

Applications

• Borland Eureka the Solver
• Borland Reflex
• Quattro
• Quattro Pro
• Sprint

Games

• Turbo GameWorks (Turbo Pascal Source and Executables for Bridge, Go-Moku, and Chess)
• Word Wizard (Requires Turbo Lightning)

See also[link]

• List of file formats (alphabetical)
• Lotus Dev. Corp. v. Borland Int'l, Inc.

References[link]

Notes

Bibliography

External links[link]

• Official website
• Micro Focus official site
• Borland Software Corporation, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Form 8-K filing, July 27, 2009 (formally notifying SEC of the Change of Control under which Borland became a Micro Focus subsidiary)

Wes Borland
Borland performing with Limp Bizkit at Sonisphere 2011.
Background information
Born	(1975-02-07) February 7, 1975 (age 37) Richmond, Virginia
Genres	Rock
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, bass, piano, keyboards, drums, violin, cello, percussion, programming
Years active	1993–present
Associated acts	Limp Bizkit, Black Light Burns, Big Dumb Face, From First to Last, Marilyn Manson, X Japan
Notable instruments
Jackson Warrior Jackson Randy Rhoads Yamaha CV820 WB Ibanez RG7 CST PRS Standard 24

Wes Borland (born Wesley Louden Borland on February 7, 1975) is an American rock musician and artist. Originally from Virginia, Borland attended high school in Tennessee, and college in Florida, where he developed his skills as a sculptor and painter. Borland is best known as the guitarist of the multi-platinum rock band Limp Bizkit with whom he has released five studio albums. In 1998, Borland formed a side project, Big Dumb Face, with whom he released one album.

In 2001, Borland left Limp Bizkit. After rejoining the band in 2004, Borland formed another band, Black Light Burns, with whom he released two studio albums. Borland left Limp Bizkit following the release of their album The Unquestionable Truth (Part 1) (2005). The original lineup of Limp Bizkit reunited in 2009, and recorded another album, Gold Cobra (2011). Borland is known for his sonic experimentation and elaborate visual appearance, which has included face and body paint, masks and uniforms. He has drawn album covers and created artwork for many of his music projects.

Biography[link]

Wes Borland grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, he initially took an interest in becoming a drummer, but because his parents didn't take to the idea of bringing percussive instruments into their household, Borland began taking guitar lessons from a member of his parents' Presbyterian church.^[1] Borland's musical interests were at odds with the local music trends which leaned largely toward country music. He recalled, "I would bring in something, and my teacher would go, 'I've never heard of the Damned. Don't you want to play some Merle Haggard?'"^[1]

Borland's brother, Scott, took an interest in bass guitar, and the two brothers began playing together.^[1] Borland's interest in hip hop music piqued with the release of Anthrax and Public Enemy's collaboration, a cover of the latter's song "Bring the Noise".^[1] Borland moved to Jacksonville, Florida with his parents, where he began attending art school due to his disinterest in the local music scene. There, he began practicing sculpture making and special effects.^[1] Borland continued to take guitar lessons, working with a teacher that specialized in jazz. According to Borland, "My first teacher ingrained playing by ear so much that when my jazz teacher gave me a sheet of music and a tape to go with it, I would learn the tape instantly and go in and play it, but I couldn't make myself learn the music."^[1] As his guitar skills improved, Borland began to craft guitar parts.^[1] Wes Borland felt confined by being forced to attend church despite his disinterest in organized religion, and moved out when he was reaching the age of 18.^[1]

Limp Bizkit (1994–1999)[link]

Wes Borland joined Limp Bizkit, a band formed by Fred Durst, Sam Rivers and Rivers' cousin John Otto.^[2] Limp Bizkit developed a cult following in the underground music scene, particularly at the Milk Bar, an underground punk club in downtown Jacksonville, Florida.^{[citation needed]} The band attracted crowds by word of mouth and covering George Michael's "Faith" and Paula Abdul's "Straight Up"; the band also gave energetic live performances in which Borland appeared in bizarre costumes.^[2] Borland's theatrical rock style was the primary attraction for many concert attendees.^[2] After DJ Lethal joined the band as a turntablist, Borland left Limp Bizkit after a disagreement with Durst.^[2] However, Borland rejoined after the band signed with Mojo, a subsidiary of MCA Records.^[2] After a dispute with Mojo, Limp Bizkit signed with Flip, a subsidiary of Interscope Records, and recorded their debut, Three Dollar Bill, Yall$, which featured an abrasive, angry sound that Limp Bizkit used to attract listeners to their music.^[2]

Although the album was met with minimal response, touring consistently increased Limp Bizkit's success, and the third single from Three Dollar Bill, Yall$, "Faith", became a radio hit, leading to a slot on Ozzfest, a tour organized by Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne.^[3] In 1998, Borland formed a side project, Big Dumb Face, influenced by Ween and Mr. Bungle.^[4]

Mainstream success (1999–2001)[link]

Significant Other saw Limp Bizkit reaching a new level of commercial success. The album climbed to No. 1 on the Billboard 200, selling 643,874 copies in its first week of release.^[5] In 2000, Durst announced that the band's third studio album would be titled Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water. The press thought that Durst was joking about this title.^[6] The album title is intended to sound like a fictional band; the phrase "Chocolate Starfish" referred to Durst himself, as he had frequently been called an asshole.^[6] Borland contributed the other half of the album's title when the band was standing around at a truck stop, looking at bottles of flavored water, and Borland joked that the truck stop didn't have hot dog or meat-flavored water.^[6]

Departure from Limp Bizkit, side projects and reunion (2001–2011)[link]

In March 2001, Big Dumb Face released its début album, Duke Lion Fights the Terror!! Borland stated that the band's music is "really silly and idiotic and bizarre. [...] It's nothing but stupid [...] just all these retarded songs."^[4] In the fall of 2001, Borland left Limp Bizkit.^[7] In August 2004, Borland rejoined Limp Bizkit and recorded another album, The Unquestionable Truth (Part 1).^[8][9][10] In 2005, Borland formed another side project Black Light Burns. After Borland left Limp Bizkit again, Black Light Burns released its début album, Cruel Melody. Allmusic writer Greg Prato wrote, "For many, Borland was the only Limp Bizkit member who was taken seriously. As evidenced by Cruel Melody, he is now officially allowed to follow whichever musical path he so desires."^[11] In 2008, Borland, along with Richard Fortus and Sugizo, supported Japanese metal band X Japan at their sold out reunion concerts at the Tokyo Dome.^[12] In 2009, the original lineup of Limp Bizkit reunited and began touring. The band recorded a new album, which Borland named Gold Cobra.^[13] Released on June 28, 2011, it received mixed reviews,^[14] with multiple reviewers appraising Borland's guitar playing.^[15][16] It peaked at #16 on the Billboard 200.^[17]

Borland has also gone onto a remixing career with his distribution of alternative versions of songs by metal bands. Most recently, The Word Alive has had their song "The Hounds of Anubis" remixed by Borland.^[18]

On April 20 2012, Borland made a series of tweets criticizing progressive metal band Dream Theater in response to a fan's comment praising the band. Borland made several remarks about the band putting technical prowess and musical complexity over feeling and soul. This caused several fellow twitter users to criticize Borland in the days following his first tweet for being himself known more for his gimmicks, such as body painting, rather than musicality.^[19]

Equipment[link]

Borland used Ibanez seven-string guitars exclusively from 1997 until 1999. However, he stated that he played a 6-string guitar on the entire Three Dollar Bill, Yall$ record. Shortly after embarking on a tour with Korn, Ibanez got ahold of Borland and gave him a number of seven-string Universe guitars, essentially for free, which he continued to use extensively. During the touring in support of Significant Other, Borland used two custom Ibanez RG seven-strings with the electronic setup of an Ibanez AX7521 (two volume knobs and two tone knobs rather than one volume and one tone). Nothing is certain about the type of pickups that he used, however, he did use EMG pickups at one point, stating in an interview with GuitarCenter that he was moving from "passive to active pickups". Borland also endorsed the rare Ibanez RG7CST guitar, which is made from superior/high-quality materials and is also equipped with a GraphTech designed piezo system on a locking tremolo. He is currently one of two American owners of one. Additionally, Ibanez also made him a 4-string baritone guitar modeled after the AX120 model, which he used on songs such as "Nookie", "Full Nelson", and "The One". This was eventually replaced by a custom-made Master Guitars "Cremona" 4-string.

During the recording for Chocolate Starfish And The Hot Dog Flavored Water, Borland switched to 6-string guitars. The entire album was recorded using a Master Guitars Cremona semi-hollow body guitar, which is visible in the video for My Generation. However, Borland did not tour with this guitar and instead used Paul Reed Smith guitars, one of which is a Standard 24 in a Platinum Metallic finish, the other one being a Custom 24 in a Black Slate finish. After the tour, they were not seen again.

In 2005, Yamaha approached Wes Borland about a new signature guitar, which was almost 100% designed by Wes Borland. The model CV820WB was released that same year. It is a semi-hollow body guitar with a large body and new Yamaha high-output split field humbuckers, made exclusively for that guitar. It also comes with the new Yamaha Quick Change finger-clamp locking tremolo system, which rids the user of having to cut the ball ends off of the strings, which is very unusual for a locking tremolo. This was Borland's main guitar for the recording of Black Light Burns' Cruel Melody and the touring behind it, as well as most of the touring Limp Bizkit did before the recording of Gold Cobra. Despite its innovative characteristics, it wasn't a popular guitar, per se, and was discontinued in mid-2011, when Borland switched to Jackson Guitars, more or less beginning with the recording of Gold Cobra.

Borland was endorsed by Jackson shortly before the release of Gold Cobra, and owned several Rhoads guitars, which he used on Limp Bizkit shows. He now plays a custom white Warrior model with black bevels, and a Gun Metal Grey Warrior, along with a white Randy Rhoads guitar. He does not currently have a signature model with Jackson. Additionally, Wes also uses a Fender Bass VI extended scale guitar, tuned to one octave below E standard tuning. He uses this song on "The Story" on The Unquestionable Truth (Pt. 1), and again on "90.2.10", "Walking Away", and "Back Porch" on the Gold Cobra album.

Borland tunes his guitars to C# standard tuning (C# F# B E G# C#) and to Drop B tuning (B F# B E G# C#). He also tunes his 4-string baritone guitars to a variant of this tuning with a low F# string, which is a bass string (F# F# B E).

Borland uses Ernie Ball .011-.052 gauge nickel-wound strings, where the G string is wound. For Limp Bizkit's first three albums, Borland used Mesa-Boogie Dual and Triple Rectifier amps, but has played mainly Orange Amps since touring in support of Cruel Melody began and has continued to use them since then.

Style[link]

"Shotgun" (sample) noicon "Shotgun", from Limp Bizkit's album Gold Cobra, highlights Borland's unique playing style in this solo. Problems listening to this file? See media help.

Borland's guitar playing is experimental and nontraditional, and he is noted for his creative use of six and seven-string guitars.^[20] Three Dollar Bill, Yall$ features him playing without a guitar pick, performing with two hands, one playing melodic notes, and the other playing chord progressions.^[2] The song "Stuck" uses a sustain pedal in the first bar, and muted riffs in the second bar.^[21] His guitar playing has made use of octave shapes, and choppy, eighth-note rhythms, sometimes accompanied by muting his strings with his left hand, creating a percussive sound.^[21] Borland has also made use of unevenly accented syncopated sixteenth notes to create a disorienting effect, and hypnotic, droning licks.^[21]

Borland writes songs by forming them in rough outlines and filling in the details later. According to Borland, "I'm good at creating ideas while using a guitar in a new way, but it takes me a long time. I can't just come up with stuff fast and rip it up. I think about constructing songs, and even riffs, in the same way as a painting, putting on a little bit at a time. They're sketchy at first, and then I know what I want, and I fit notes into places."^[1]

Borland is also known for performing in costumes and body paint during concerts, appearing in bunny and kung fu suits,^[2] and painted as a skeleton and what he describes as a "burnt match". Describing the character, he stated, "I go onstage wearing almost nothing. I have underwear and my boots on, and I paint my whole head black—from the neck up—and I have the black contacts. All you can see is these glowing teeth."^[2][20] Borland's black contacts were customized for him by a company noted for making contacts for the science fiction TV series Babylon 5.^[20]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Wes Borland on Twitter
• Black Light Burns {{{2}}}

Fred Durst
Durst at the premiere of Baby Mama at the 2008 Tribeca Film Festival
Background information
Birth name	William Frederick Durst
Born	(1970-08-20) August 20, 1970 (age 41) Gastonia, North Carolina
Origin	Jacksonville, Florida, United States
Genres	Nu metal, rap metal
Occupations	Musician, film director
Instruments	Vocals, guitar
Years active	1994–2006; 2009–present
Associated acts	Limp Bizkit

Fred Durst (born August 20, 1970) is an American musician and film director from Jacksonville, Florida. Durst grew up in Gastonia, North Carolina and played in a number of local bands in Florida while mowing lawns and working as a tattoo artist for financial support. Durst is best known as the vocalist of the multi-platinum rock band Limp Bizkit, formed in 1994, with whom he has released six studio albums.

Since 2006, Durst has also become known for his work in independent films. He costarred in the film Population 436, and made his directorial debut in 2007 with the film The Education of Charlie Banks. Durst directed a second film, The Longshots in 2008, and will direct another film, Pawn Shop Chronicles, which is currently in production.

Biography[link]

Early life[link]

Fred Durst was born and grew up in Gastonia, North Carolina, where he took an interest in breakdancing, hip hop, punk rock and heavy metal. He began to rap, skate, beatbox and deejay. After dropping out of United States Navy bootcamp, Durst returned to Jacksonville, Florida, where he mowed lawns and worked as a tattoo artist for money, and began developing an idea for a band that combined elements of rock and hip hop.^[1][2]

Durst played with three other bands, Split 26, Malachi Sage, which were unsuccessful, and 10 Foot Shindig, which Durst left to form a new band.^[3]

Formation of Limp Bizkit (1994–1998)[link]

Wes Borland and Fred Durst performing with Limp Bizkit at the Movistar Arena in Santiago, Chile on July 21, 2011.

In 1994, Durst, Malachi Sage bassist Sam Rivers and Rivers' cousin John Otto, jammed and wrote three songs together, and Wes Borland later joined their band as a guitarist.^[3] Durst named the band Limp Bizkit, because he wanted a name that would repel listeners.^[3] Limp Bizkit developed a cult following in the underground music scene, attracting crowds by word of mouth and covering George Michael's "Faith" and Paula Abdul's "Straight Up".^[3]

Later, when Korn performed in town as the opening act for Sick of It All, Durst invited Korn to drink beer and tattoo the band members. Although Durst's tattoos were unimpressive, he was able to persuade Reginald Arvizu to listen to a demo by Limp Bizkit, consisting of the songs "Pollution", "Counterfeit" and "Stuck". Korn added a then-unsigned Limp Bizkit to two tours, which gave the band a new audience.^[3][4] DJ Lethal, formerly of the hip hop group House of Pain, joined the band as a turntablist; Durst's disagreements with Borland led the guitarist to quit and rejoin the band.^[3]

In 1997, Limp Bizkit signed with Flip, a subsidiary of Interscope Records, and released their debut album, Three Dollar Bill, Yall$ to minimal response. However, despite the lukewarm response to his band's album, Durst was appointed Senior Vice President of A&R at Interscope.^[5] On October 23, 1997, Durst met the band Staind, and reacted negatively to their album's cover, attempting to get them thrown off the bill due to its offensiveness.^[5] However, Durst later praised the band's performance, telling them that they were "the best band he had seen in two years."^[5] Subsequently, Durst drove to Florida and recorded a demo with the band, helping coach vocalist Aaron Lewis.^[5] Durst also introduced producer Ross Robinson to the band Cold.^[5]

After Limp Bizkit finished a tour with the band Deftones, Durst and DJ Lethal were asked by Max Cavalera, formerly of the band Sepultura, to appear on "Bleed", a song from the self-titled debut of his new band Soulfly. Cavalera stated that producer Ross Robinson recommended that he work with Durst.^[6] Durst also made an appearance on Korn's album Follow the Leader. Jonathan Davis had intended to write a battle rap with B-Real of Cypress Hill, but the latter's label wouldn't let him do it, and Durst was tapped instead.^[6] Davis and Durst wrote the lyrics for "All in the Family", which featured the two vocalists trading insults. Davis and Durst would often offer suggestions for each others lyrics; a lyric written by Durst as "tootin' on your bagpipe" was changed to "fagpipes" by Davis, who stated "I helped him bag on me better".^[6]

Durst began to take an interest in directing, and directed a music video for Limp Bizkit's single "Faith" in promotion for its appearance in the film Very Bad Things, but was unsatisfied with it, and directed a second video which paid tribute to tourmates like Primus, Deftones and Mötley Crüe, who appeared in the video.^[6]

Mainstream success and controversies (1999–2005)[link]

Limp Bizkit achieved mainstream success with the albums Significant Other (1999) and Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water (2000). In the summer of 1999, Limp Bizkit played at the highly anticipated Woodstock '99 show in front of approximately 200,000 people. Violent action sprang up during and after their performance, including fans tearing plywood from the walls during a performance of the song "Break Stuff". Several sexual assaults, that included but were not limited to rapes, were reported in the aftermath of the concert.^[4][5][7] Durst stated during the concert, "People are getting hurt. Don't let anybody get hurt. But I don't think you should mellow out. That's what Alanis Morissette had you motherfuckers do. If someone falls, pick 'em up. We already let the negative energy out. Now we wanna let out the positive energy".^[5] Durst later stated in an interview, "I didn't see anybody getting hurt. You don't see that. When you're looking out on a sea of people and the stage is twenty feet in the air and you're performing, and you're feeling your music, how do they expect us to see something bad going on?"^[5] Les Claypool told the San Francisco Examiner, "Woodstock was just Durst being Durst. His attitude is 'no press is bad press', so he brings it on himself. He wallows in it. Still, he's a great guy."^[5]

In June 2000, Limp Bizkit performed at the WXRK Dysfunctional Family Picnic, but showed up an hour late for their set.^[8] An Interscope spokesman stated that there was confusion over the band's set time.^[8] During the band's performance, Durst criticized Creed singer Scott Stapp, calling him "an egomaniac".^[8] Creed's representatives later presented Durst with an autographed anger management manual during a later appearance on Total Request Live.^[8] In the summer, Limp Bizkit's tour was sponsored by the controversial file sharing service Napster. Durst was an outspoken advocate of file sharing.^[4]

During the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards, Durst performed Limp Bizkit's song "Livin' It Up", as a duet with Christina Aguilera. In response to the performance, Filter frontman Richard Patrick called Durst a "pop-lovin' piece of frozen dog shit" and claimed that "Fred getting onstage with Christina Aguilera embarrassed us all."^[9] In response to the negative reactions to the performance, Durst remarked, "I already told you guys before, I did it all for the nookie, man."^[9] Aguilera, in response to Durst's remark, commented, "He got no nookie."^[10]

During a 2001 tour of Australia at the Big Day Out festival in Sydney, fans rushed the stage in the mosh pit, and teenager Jessica Michalik died of asphyxiation. In court, Durst testified he had warned the concert's organizers Aaron Jackson, Will Pearce and Amar Tailor and promoter Vivian Lees of the potential dangers of such minimal security.^[11] After viewing videotapes and hearing witness testimony, however, the coroner said it was evident that the density of the crowd was dangerous at the time Limp Bizkit took the stage, stating that Fred Durst should have acted more responsibly when the problem became apparent.^[12] Durst stated that he was "emotionally scarred" because of the teenager's death.^[13]

In 2002, Durst was tapped to write songs for Britney Spears, and later said that he was in a relationship with her. However, Spears denied Durst's claims.^[14] In a 2009 interview, he explained that "I just guess at the time it was taboo for a guy like me to be associated with a gal like her."^[14] In February 2005, a sex tape featuring Durst was released on the Internet. Durst filed a $70 million lawsuit against ten websites that posted the video.^[15][16]

In March, Limp Bizkit participated on the Summer Sanitarium Tour, headlined by Metallica.^[17] At the tour's stop in Chicago, IL, attendees of the concert threw items and heckled Durst from the moment he walked on stage. With the crowd chanting "Fuck Fred Durst" and continuing their assault on him, Durst threw the mic down after six songs and walked off stage, but not before heckling the crowd back.^[18] An article in the Sun-Times stated that the hostility was started by radio personality Mancow.^[19]

In May 2005, The Unquestionable Truth (Part 1) was released. Sammy Siegler took over drumming duties for the band for much of the album. At Durst's insistence, the album was released as an underground album, without any advertising or promotion.^[20][21] The album sold over 1,000,000 copies worldwide, peaking at number 24 on the Billboard 200.^[22][23] Durst later announced that despite the album's title, no sequel to The Unquestionable Truth would be produced.^[24] Later in the year, the band released a Greatest Hitz album.^[25]

Film career (2006 onward)[link]

While Limp Bizkit was on hiatus, Durst began working in independent films, earning higher acclaim for his film work than his music.^[24] In 2006, Durst costarred in the film Population 436. His directorial debut, The Education of Charlie Banks was released the following year. The film, which starred Jesse Eisenberg, Chris Marquette and Jason Ritter, received mixed reviews; Rotten Tomatoes, a review aggravate, assigned the film a "Tomatometer" score of 46%. The website's consensus stated, "Unevenness and earnestness mire this otherwise sweet, surprising coming of age drama."^[26] A second directorial effort, The Longshots, starring Ice Cube and Keke Palmer, was released in 2008. Rotten Tomatoes assigned the film a score of 39%, with the consensus indicating that the film was "a largely formulaic affair, rarely deviating from the inspirational sports movie playbook."^[27] The same year, Durst appeared as a bartender in the House, M.D. episodes "House's Head" and "Wilson's Heart".^[28] Durst will direct and produce Pawn Shop Chronicles, starring Paul Walker.^[29] Coproducer Jordan Schur described the film as "a hillbilly Pulp Fiction".^[29]

Limp Bizkit reunion (2009-present)[link]

In 2009, the original lineup of Limp Bizkit reunited and began touring. Durst announced that they had begun to record a new album, which would be titled Gold Cobra.^[30] The album was released on June 28, 2011, receiving mixed reviews.^[31] It peaked at number 16 on the Billboard 200.^[23] Durst has a nine year old son named Dallas from another relationship.^[32] In 2009, Durst married Esther Nazarov and split after three months.^[33] In 2012, Durst appeared on the Insane Clown Posse cover album Covered, Smothered & Chunked, appearing on the AMG cover "Bitch Better Have My Money".^[34] Durst resides in Los Angeles, California.^[35]

Filmography[link]

References[link]