Linkin Park

[Babali]

I agree, sounds like a mix between an ATS b-side and something they'd do for a Transformers movie. Not sure how I'm going to edit Mike's rap out, but I'm probably going to have to, I really don't like it. The song is really generic, but sometimes I like generic.


edit: Made an edit without Mike's rap. Much better..

[PhoenixML]

I had such a good laugh listening to the new single.

Terrible production, ok song.

[Space Suicide]

I listened to it for curiosity at how bad it might bem even though I'm not a fan. I have one question,

What exactly are they going for? Are they trying to be a problem solving alternative rock band with their socially aware tunes? Serious, no trolling, what exactly are they trying to attain? Shinoda's random 20 second rap doesn't even belong in the song at all.

[neorev]

i actually enjoyed their last album for being different from their usual stuff... but this new song is pretty bad. i'm sorry, but it's not a memorable track. +1000x about the rap part feeling out of place and just thrown in so they can be like, "oh hey look he still raps and we have a rap part."

[wight rabbit]

As much as I do not like the song, some of Chesters vocals and pitches I do enjoy. It sound like a b-side from A Thousand Suns to be honest. When Mike starting rapping and then it just ends abruptly, it seemed so out of place for the song all together. Hopefully they have more tricks up their sleeves than this... ugh.

Wow, since teaming with Rubin, EVERY single I have heard from them sounds the same as the last. I'm another one that lost interest after Meteora and haven't been given a reason to give these guys another chance. They need to get some edge to their music, or something...

[richardp]

I feel like people that DON'T like Linkin Park actually liked the last album, and everyone who LIKES Linkin Park hated it.

I really enjoyed that album.

[bobbie solo]

touring all summer on a pre-packaged tour from Honda with fucking INCUBUS will not help their blandness problem. Everything from these two has been shit/a snorefest for a few years now. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzz

[Kid Charlemagne]

I heard the new song unknowingly on my way to the airport on KROQ and it sounded very plain. If it weren't for Chester's vocals, it would sound like every other alt-band trying to make it that KROQ plays the shit out of.

[ImTheWiseJanitor]

I have to agree about the sameness that this song has compared to past singles, but I can't say I hate it or anything. I think Phoenix ML has it right with "terrible production, ok song"...And fuck, is it just me, or does anyone else think of Black Eyed Peas for some reason once Shinoda starts rapping? Not saying that it keeps me from completely enjoying the song, but for some reason it's just there in my mind like a splinter.

[GoodSoldier333]

Hybrid Theory and Meteora were huge on me growing up. I still tune in to new singles, songs, and new records. But they no longer have any impact on me

[aggroculture]

Instantly forgettable and bland. Sounds like a bad Christmas song from the 80s.
Also Chester Bennington's hunched frame bothers me. Stand up straight or visit a chiropractor.

[carpenoctem]

New album is to be titled Living Things and will be released on June 26. Exciting!! I quite like Burn It Down, it has the flavor of A Thousand Suns but I also got nostalgia flashbacks to Hybrid Theory big time. So I guess it's pretty much what they described it to be: combining the sound of their previous albums with what they've learned through their experimenting. Sounds like this one will be a crowd pleaser. (Nothing wrong with that, by the way.)

Also, the album art is really cool:

1.	"Lost in the Echo"
2.	"In My Remains"
3.	"Burn It Down"	3:51
4.	"Lies Greed Misery"
5.	"I'll Be Gone" (feat. String Arrangements by Owen Pallett)
6.	"Castle of Glass"
7.	"Victimized"
8.	"Roads Untraveled"
9.	"Skin to Bone"
10.	"Until It Breaks"
11.	"Tinfoil"
12.	"Powerless"

(from Wikipedia)

[thelastdisciple]

Some insight from Mike Shinoda.

Many of you know our story up until this point. We built the band upon the idea of fusing all our favorite styles of music–as different as they might be–into one, signature sound. Our first two albums were the result of a lot of hard work, perseverance, smarts, and luck, to build a toolbox that would provide us with what we needed to make the best songs we could at the time.Success came at a pivotal time in an industry that was about to take a nosedive, and we were able to establish ourselves before things changed drastically. Hybrid Theory became the best-selling album of the year, worldwide. After Meteora‘s success, we realized that we needed to step back and think about our future, in order to have one. We decided we had to had to veer away from the main thing upon which our success was built: the music.

When I tried to explain this pivotal moment to a friend of mine, he had a hard time understanding. He said, “It’s like you invented the Big Mac or the iPod, then decided not to sell it anymore. Why the hell would you do that?”

Trying to explain how personal and artistic choices factor in for a band like ours is difficult. As we finished up “A Thousand Suns” in 2010, I found myself having to try to do it often, in interviews and to myself. Before we even finished the songs, each guy in my band knew it was a polarizing and challenging album, one that people would probably love or hate. I suppose that it didn’t really matter if it made sense to anyone but us — for a while, we had to steer as far away from the early sound of Linkin Park as possible, or else we would be trapped making the exact same music over and over until we had to call it quits.

Thinking back: as we wrote Minutes To Midnight and A Thousand Suns, I would sometimes bring in demos that sounded like something from the first two albums. Those demos were always met with a negative reaction by my bandmates, and I tended to agree. I loved the journey toward a new, unknown sound. With each experiment, we discovered new ways to make songs, and we filled our toolbox with tons of new tools. With each song, we tried both cutting-edge and classic gear; we started with radically different seeds; and we approached the vocals with a virtual blindfold on. And, about a year ago, I realized that our toolbox was virtually overflowing with great tools.
But we were avoiding something.

In the early part of our career, we were inexperienced. We made decisions on all fronts that some of us regret (some times a little, some times a lot). And some decisions (like my fire-engine red hair back in the day) were things that I don’t really regret, but I simply wouldn’t do today. All those things spun together to create a complicated uneasiness about the past that the band wasn’t able to come to terms with for a while.

Luckily, I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. Over the course of the last year, the subject kept popping up, and we talked about how to tastefully bridge the gap between all the musical places we’ve been, to marry together all the ideas we’ve accumulated about how to make a song. And as LIVING THINGS began taking shape, the most powerful shift I saw take place was the acceptance and eagerness to use all the tools in the toolbox, not just some. Everything at once, together.

Some people have already compared our new album to the early ones. I suppose it depends on how you want to make that comparison (by the way, it’s certainly not about guitars). For me, it’s all about getting back to the real “hybrid theory” — not the album with that name, but the idea that the six guys in our band have drastically different tastes in music, and the blending of all those sounds into one is exactly what we built our band upon.

[Babali]

That was cool I enjoyed it.

[thelastdisciple]

I think it's something people and myself included tend to forget a lot of the time that it's SO easier to judge from the outside looking in not just with music but with so many other things and Linkin Park seems to be one of those bands who always gets this treatment no matter what. I mean sure that part of the point in making music at all is so that people can reflect and relate to it, others will have different approach but ultimately it falls to a similar goal at the same time though it just all depends on what happens in the studio and what actually jives with the band itself.

They are musicians who are also fans of other music and i am sure they have their favorite and least favorite albums of the artists that we even enjoy around here but i think at least to the casual listener who just wants to be ignorant and troll and knows nothing about the challenges and the craft of making music itself (which i think describes a LOT of people), than i would be a lot faster in dismissing your opinion of them as wholeheartedly invalid. These guys are professionals by now and i think they know what they're doing, who is anyone to really tell them otherwise? since when did everyone become members of the band?

Constructive mindful criticisms and opinions are clearly and obviously valid toward any band and no doubt they take and consider ALL of that in good measure to better their music (there ARE exceptions of course for completely EVIDENT sellouts like Nickelback) but someone who just comes along and blindly, ignorantly throws it out there that they suck and they don't know what they're doing is completely full of 100% pure solid shit.

[Babali]

I think it's something people and myself included tend to forget a lot of the time that it's SO easier to judge from the outside looking in not just with music but with so many other things and Linkin Park seems to be one of those bands who always gets this treatment no matter what. I mean sure that part of the point in making music at all is so that people can reflect and relate to it, others will have different approach but ultimately it falls to a similar goal at the same time though it just all depends on what happens in the studio and what actually jives with the band itself.

They are musicians who are also fans of other music and i am sure they have their favorite and least favorite albums of the artists that we even enjoy around here but i think at least to the casual listener who just wants to be ignorant and troll and knows nothing about the challenges and the craft of making music itself (which i think describes a LOT of people), than i would be a lot faster in dismissing your opinion of them as wholeheartedly invalid. These guys are professionals by now and i think they know what they're doing, who is anyone to really tell them otherwise? since when did everyone become members of the band?

Constructive mindful criticisms and opinions are clearly and obviously valid toward any band and no doubt they take and consider ALL of that in good measure to better their music (there ARE exceptions of course for completely EVIDENT sellouts like Nickelback) but someone who just comes along and blindly, ignorantly throws it out there that they suck and they don't know what they're doing is completely full of 100% pure solid shit.

This has been my approach to music for years and it is why I still enjoy Linkin Park among acts like David Bowie, Prince, Roxy Music, Nine Inch Nails, Bob Marley, Michael Jackson, Queen, Pink Floyd, etc. I know how hard it is to craft good music. I didn't appreciate it as much three/four years ago and before. And if I enjoy a song, I enjoy a song, I don't let anyone's opinions influence me.

[thelastdisciple]

Got my ticket to see Linkin Park here in Calgary, Alberta (first time ever playing here) on September 1st.

I went for the pre-sale early bird tickets that my local radio station X929 (they're running the festival X-Fest) was offering to the first 100 people who lined up at their studios, these were a handful of tickets available an hour before the ones online would go for sale at 10 am. I got there at 11:30pm Sunday night and was the 3rd person in line for when the tickets were to go on sale Monday morning at 9am.....I've never done this kind of thing before so it was quite an adventurous thing for me to do staying awake all night sitting on cold ass dirty pavement lol i didn't really come prepared but as i was introduced to the others that were there they offered me space to sit on their sleeping bags and what not which was nice of them.

It was some good times, there were about 7 of us for a while just chllin' and hanging out... haha i ended up talking straight Nine Inch Nails for like an hour and a half with this one guy Had my iPod with me luckily so we had some good music to listen to.

Some guy that was in line when i first got there left to get smokes or something but he never came back lol and later on he called in to the station to complain because he was arrested for pissing in public, that was too funny.

All in all it was a good idea that i went and did this (although i guess i could have showed up later since the majority of people didn't even start lining up till around 6 am, i was psychologically manipulated by this stupid tweet that went out from the radio station saying that were people already there, but didn't say how many of course the way my mind tends to wander i figured there was like 20 or so already) because when the online tickets went on sale there were so many problems that i read about which had to do with web traffic and site crashes and i guess the tickets pretty much sold out in minutes, it leads me to wonder why the hell there are STILL tech issues like that with these kinds of ticket retailers, it's like they know damn well there will be a huge demand so why not have the servers that are built to support high traffic, it's crazy. Anyways those were just the early bird ones that sold out though and they were going for 50$ which was what i payed for and basically after those are all gone the online price jumps up to 90$.

I have to say i definitely prefer lining up in person for tickets and seeing my chances physically as opposed to relying on stupid websites which always seem to crash if it's a big show or if it's all scalped and then you're screwed and anything that ends up on ebay or craigslist is way over priced.

[gorast]

Tour dates pissed me off when they were announced, closest one to me was Atlanta and there's no way for me to get there. And from the way they've been talking, it seems like this'll be the only US tour until next year, or even later than that.

[ImTheWiseJanitor]

Aw, that's cute. They want $96 for a ticket. I think I'll pass.

[Conan The Barbarian]

96? Who do they think they are?

[cicatriz]

a really, really popular band?

[thelastdisciple]

Not that it really matters or has any bearing on anything because just like awards or record sales it doesn't reflect talent level, "BEST BAND OF ALL TIME OMGZ" or anything outside of just a sheer amount of possible "mainstream sheeple" they could cater to, though that's not to say everyone that likes them is following the flocks either i mean i like them because i like them and i like all kinds of music as do others in this thread but they do have 40+ million likes on Facebook which is pretty wild on its own especially just ignoring the fact that there's probably loads of spam accounts and duplicates or people working for Warner.

Nickelback for such a mainstream band that probably gets WAY more radio play than Linkin Park does happen to have only 13 million in comparison and they seem to cause way more international outrage and annoyance for non-fans because of their popularity or acceptance toward their shitty generic sound from narrow-minded individuals, i would have figured for such a notorious band there would be a helluva lot more likes to suit the commonality and hate toward them.

More often than not it always seemed to work that way where if any said band had a plethora of fans to ridiculous degrees they were overrated and there'd be also an extreme plethora of hate and at least as far as what i have been witness to the 40 million suggests that more people actually sincerely like Linkin Park in opposition to what you'd usually think. So maybe there is some evidence there that LP might actually be doing something right contrary to some beliefs?

Could you actually argue that LP are worse than Nickelback?

I don't know what that means in the end, Lady GaGa even has 50 million likes so there's obviously no logic to any of this... it's ass backwards if you ask me but it's still surprising given the receptions of either band.

[Babali]

Hybrid Theory was like the number one or second best selling album of the 2000's, if I recall correctly. It was huge. Linkin Park are a gigantic band. In The End, Numb, Crawling, Breaking The Habit, Leave Out All The Rest, etc. etc. etc.

[PhoenixML]

Hybrid Theory was like the number one or second best selling album of the 2000's, if I recall correctly. It was huge. Linkin Park are a gigantic band. In The End, Numb, Crawling, Breaking The Habit, Leave Out All The Rest, etc. etc. etc.

Leave Out All The Rest... This song... I hate it. Not because it's bad. It's because when you are listening to Minutes to Midnight, it's the "2nd" song (or 3rd, whatever). Given Up was ok, but then you get to this song and you know! You know it's all going to hell!

[ImTheWiseJanitor]

They played a new song on BBC Radio 1 earlier, called "Lies Greed Misery."

While it's a pretty safe-sounding song, I've gotta say I like it a HELL of a lot more than "Burn It Down." Edit: I guess when I say safe, I mean "trendy" or something.

Also, since it was the big prize for their scavenger hunt thing, they let the guy who found the last clue keep the thumb drive it was on and told him to add his name or whatever he wanted to the MP3 name, then told him to leak it online.

[aggroculture]

Another leaked song:

[PhoenixML]

I personally prefer Burn It Down over Lies Greed Misery.

[Self.Destructive.Pattern]

This is MUCH better than Burn It Down.

[ImTheWiseJanitor]

I personally prefer Burn It Down over Lies Greed Misery.

I'm really wondering if that song might just need time for me to enjoy it. It's not a terrible song. But I thought the same thing about The Catalyst when it came out, and it grew on me a bit after a while. Still not one of my favorites from that album, though.

This is MUCH better than Burn It Down.

As easy as it is to tell that they're hoping on the "glitchy, electronic, dubstep-sounding beats" train with this one, I think I like it simply because it sounds so...I dunno, positive, I guess. You'd think a song called "Lies Greed Misery" would be a bit of a downer, but I don't get that feeling here.

[theruiner]

Oh, dear God. Lies Greed Misery...is this for real? No offense to the people who like it, but this is unlistenable. Especially the chorus. Honestly, this sounds like a joke.