"Fighting Myself" from Meteora|20 Released

[LPLStaff]

On March 24, 2023, exactly 20 years after the original release of Meteora, Linkin Park released "Fighting Myself" from the Meteora 20 box set for fans. Originally premiered on Howard Stern in February by Mike Shinoda, the song was not released until March 24, likely due to the massive success of the first single "Lost."

When discussing the song, Mike said that he had to build a chorus and the bridge/ending vocals himself from parts that Chester had recorded, but were not in the latest version of the song that existed - they were just in the multitracks. "I thought all we had was a demo and me rapping verse one and verse two and that was it, but Ryan from management found a version where Chester was singing and then we found the session of that song and I went into the multitracks and found different chorus ideas. It went from a rough sketch to a finished chorus, so now we have a full song with vocals. I remember writing it and working on it but it didn't make the cut so we just stopped working on it, so now I found the sessions for it." 

 

"Fighting Myself" is out now and features signature Mike Shinoda rapping along with a unique bridge/ending to the song and more.

 

What do you think of the song?

 

 

[linkindan]

It’s a great demo, better than most of what LPU got over the years

[Ahfack]

I'm loving this song. Definitely a sweet Meteora track

[JZLP-Benningstrong]

It's a really good song, I don't consider it a demo, with a better mixing it would be enough to sound similar to the album.

 

I don't think that Manny mixed this song.

 

Xeroboi said that Chester does some rap style vocals and actually he is right Chester does some backup vocals in the bridge similar to what he did in the Papercut chorus, it sounds badass.

 

the energy it's massive, too bad that Joe didn't scratch on this.

[Hybrider]

Amazing song. The best part is a bridge. I love whole song. Rapping is great. I want to hear the instrumental demo of it. In a few second clip from "Making of Meteora" there is a demo of it with raw guitar. It would be good to hear it in full version. I believe the working title of this song is called "Shortcut" based on Stagelight sample which was used in this song.

Edited March 24, 2023 by Hybrider

[Awalkinthelinkinpark]

The intro is by far the best part of the song "There's nowhere..." Lyrics are good, fits the time. But the song as a whole is underwhelming. I get why they discarded it. 

[Diehardlpfan77]

This is literally the song I've been waiting for. They have released so many demos and unreleased songs in the past but none of the songs measure up to this one. It has the classical linkin park vibe to it(Mike's rap and Chester singing/Screaming). Plus the Bridge is the highlight of the song. It adds a whole new dimension to the song. I know a lot of people like that they moved away from this kind of music. But I've always wondered what it would be like if they kept making songs like this. I finally got my wish. I'm hoping rest of the forgotten demos have vocals in them. 

[Hybrider]

40 minutes ago, Diehardlpfan77 said:

I've always wondered what it would be like if they kept making songs like this.

It would be super good and the band would gain more success than they have now.

[PizzaPino]

Not my cup of tea too tbh and somehow even with the albums up to OML in my mind, this doesn’t sound like LP for me lmao. This sounds like a song from another nu metal band from that era that would be long forgotten by now.  Or like an old Xero song.

Edited March 24, 2023 by PizzaPino

[leftshoe18]

I love it. The ending gives me chills even after over a dozen listens. This and Lost have already made the box set worth it to me and I haven't even got to experience any of the live tracks.

[xeroboi]

2 hours ago, Hybrider said:

It would be super good and the band would gain more success than they have now.

Na people would get burnt out with the sound  

[Awalkinthelinkinpark]

3 hours ago, PizzaPino said:

Not my cup of tea too tbh and somehow even with the albums up to OML in my mind, this doesn’t sound like LP for me lmao. This sounds like a song from another nu metal band from that era that would be long forgotten by now.  Or like an old Xero song.

Exactly

I'm so glad they matured and moved on. 

 

3 hours ago, Hybrider said:

It would be super good and the band would gain more success than they have now.

It would make 1 or 2 Russians happy, yes. 

[Stranger]

1 hour ago, xeroboi said:

Na people would get burnt out with the sound  

 

exactly. that's why the band decided to break the wall and make MTM which is the bold and brave move. look how they success till now. the band that keep making the same records over & over again, most likely wont even pass a decade.

[Qwerty18]

The way the vocal harmonizes in the chorus / bridge still gives me big-time Sum-41 vibes. The weird vocal samples and the drum beat are really cool too.

 

It's a fun tune but slightly repetitive - the 2nd chorus is pretty much the first chorus copy/pasted 2 times.  But for what it is, it's great to have it. We have to remember it is technically a demo, or as Mike put it, a 90% done song. Sure it is going to miss some attention to details other songs might have.

[Soeffingnaive92]

4 minutes ago, Qwerty18 said:

The way the vocal harmonizes in the chorus / bridge still gives me big-time Sum-41 vibes. The weird vocal samples and the drum beat are really cool too.

 

It's a fun tune but slightly repetitive - the 2nd chorus is pretty much the first chorus copy/pasted 2 times.  But for what it is, it's great to have it. We have to remember it is technically a demo, or as Mike put it, a 90% done song. Sure it is going to miss some attention to details other songs might have.

Yeah this was not like LOST, who almost made the cut, this was a song that was really far in the process but was scrapped. I’m glad we have it, it’s a holy grail definitely because it’s 110% old school LP but it’s kinda repetitive and quite similar to at least a couple of better songs. It’s great but not one of these “OMG WTF WHY THIS WAS NOT ON THE ALBUM” situations 

Edited March 24, 2023 by STRANGELOVE92

[solidss]

13 hours ago, LPLStaff said:

Mike said that he had to build a chorus and the bridge/ending vocals himself from parts that Chester had recorded, but were not in the latest version of the song that existed - they were just in the multitracks. "I thought all we had was a demo and me rapping verse one and verse two and that was it, but Ryan from management found a version where Chester was singing and then we found the session of that song and I went into the multitracks and found different chorus ideas. It went from a rough sketch to a finished chorus, so now we have a full song with vocals. I remember writing it and working on it but it didn't make the cut so we just stopped working on it, so now I found the sessions for it." 

 

I originally thought this full song with vocals was finished 20 years ago, but since Mike only recently got the multitracks, he built the song and finished the chorus. That explains why it sounds so modern and why it was never released on LPU, because Mike never actually finished the full song with vocals until recently! Very interesting story about how this all came to be.

[DylHDZ]

It’s a dope af and it’s gonna blow up! It’s already over 500k views on YouTube

[Soeffingnaive92]

53 minutes ago, DylHDZ said:

It’s a dope af and it’s gonna blow up! It’s already over 500k views on YouTube

Cracking the million in one day 

[YRQRM0]

I agree w/ a lot of the sentiment here. It's great to have and I will absolutely be jamming to it, but it also slightly gives off demo vibes just a bit to me. Maybe it's because the chorus reminds me a lot of "I Am Machine" by Three Days Grace or because it doesn't have scratching and other layers I'd expect on a finished track. For me, Lost and More The Victim are lightyears above it.

 

I wonder what the intro sound comes from or the story behind it. Like is it another melody chopped up and rearranged, and where did that melody come from if so? 

 

10 hours ago, Hybrider said:

It would be super good and the band would gain more success than they have now.

 

Nah

[linkindan]

4 hours ago, solidss said:

That explains why it sounds so modern and why it was never released on LPU, because Mike never actually finished the full song with vocals until recently!

I mean, LPU9 Faint demo? Debris? Fucking most of LPU14?

[solidss]

57 minutes ago, linkindan said:

I mean, LPU9 Faint demo? Debris? Fucking most of LPU14?

Maybe Mike didn’t feel like working on completing this track back then? He literally just explained that he JUST mixed all the stems together recently. He didn’t remember that Chesters part was actually recorded back then!

Edited March 24, 2023 by solidss

[DylHDZ]

4 hours ago, YRQRM0 said:

I agree w/ a lot of the sentiment here. It's great to have and I will absolutely be jamming to it, but it also slightly gives off demo vibes just a bit to me. Maybe it's because the chorus reminds me a lot of "I Am Machine" by Three Days Grace or because it doesn't have scratching and other layers I'd expect on a finished track. For me, Lost and More The Victim are lightyears above it.

 

I wonder what the intro sound comes from or the story behind it. Like is it another melody chopped up and rearranged, and where did that melody come from if so? 

 

 

Nah

I think the same thing but the opposite lol I think Lost and FM is lightyears above MTV. MTVs chorus sounds very demoish and raw, a lot more unfinished than FM, which nothing is wrong with it sounding raw and unpolished, but that’s just what I get from it IMO. The quality isn’t up there with the other two. Kinda like WWDK, absolutely looove it but it def sounds demoish in terms of quality compared to like Blackbirds and ATL. But I was never big on cumulus from the start which is probably why MTV was underwhelming for me but regardless I’m just glad to be getting all these gems!

[Justin]

15 hours ago, Hybrider said:

It would be super good and the band would gain more success than they have now.

They'd have become known as a relic from a bygone era. LP changed up their style right as nu-metal's mainstream popularity was fading, and they proved they were capable of more. Staying the same would've seen LP get left in the past.

 

Without the agreement LP made amongst themselves to do whatever they want to do stylistically, they probably would've broken up eventually since both Chester and Mike both had different sounds they wanted to experiment with. I don't think either of them would've been happy to make the same type of music for 20 years straight.

[witeken]

Fighting Myself is a great song. Fight me.

 

Apparently an opinion out of left field, but Lost, Fighting Myself and probably More The Victim could definitely have made the album. Let's not pretend as if some of the Meteora songs like Nobody's Listening (a song nobody is listening to anymore), Hit The Floor (which sets the floor for LP song quality) and Easier To Run (which is indeed easier than listening to this song), none of which were ever played live much, are S tier songs that couldn't have been traded in for these 2023 songs. 

 

 

I mean, Meteora definitely doesn't contain 12 Numbs, so if people liken Lost to Numb (which I personally don't really agree with either though), then Lost certainly must have been on the album. The fact that the song is doing so well proves the point that Linkin Park omitted an S tier song for some random non-musical reason.

 

In fact, apparently also a controversial opinon, but there's no fundamental reason why an album has to have a certain amount of songs. If a song's great, then why not do the effort to turn it into an album-worthy song? All this talk about songs having to fit into an album is overdone. A song is just a song. No one would have ever complained about Meteora with 16 songs.

 

Edited March 25, 2023 by witeken

[Justin]

1 hour ago, witeken said:

In fact, apparently also a controversial opinon, but there's no fundamental reason why an album has to have a certain amount of songs. If a song's great, then why not do the effort to turn it into an album-worthy song? All this talk about songs having to fit into an album is overdone. A song is just a song. No one would have ever complained about Meteora with 16 songs.

 

During the making of HT, I think it was Brad who said they intentionally aimed for a certain number of tracks and to keep the album under 40 minutes because they wanted the album to not have any filler and to not overstay its welcome.

 

It was just their mindset at the time, which we know they retained for Meteora. It wasn't until MTM when Linkin Park decided to really challenge any preconceived notions, even amongst the band members, about what they were supposed to sound like and what their albums should be.