LET DOWN // A JOURNEY INTO DBS

[LPLStaff]

Julien-K (Ryan, Amir, Fu, Galen) recently decided to celebrate Chester's birthday by doing something they have wanted to do for a long time - do a deep dive into a Dead By Sunrise song in ProTools. This is something they have mentioned previously that they wanted to do but weren't sure what the right timing or platform was. Fortunately, their Patreon ended up being perfect and they streamed a Zoom call with their Patreon members, took questions from fans, and spoke for over an hour and a half about the song.

 

In this behind-the-scenes look at the song, they pull up the very first Let Down recording they made. This was the song that started the project for them.... the true very beginning of it all. As the story goes which a lot of you are already familiar with - Chester recorded acoustic guitar and vocals for the song and then gave it to Julien-K who pretty much overnight created a full demo, which is what they show on Patreon. It has elements in the demo that didn't make the final version (the break before the bridge), fun electronic elements, even a Led Zeppelin nod on the drums, and some really cool parts. Chester's original acoustic guitar plus Amir's 12 string guitar both make appearances in the demo.

 

Watch along as they tell the story of Dead By Sunrise, go deep into the song, and show us a glimpse at a fully-unreleased version of Let Down! And good news for those who are interested... they say they want to do this for more songs.  

 

Information-wise, this is the most info on Dead By Sunrise in one sitting in a VERY long time and we're excited to watch this over and over to help formulate the song page and pick up these tiny bits in the song that we may have not noticed originally. 

 

 

 

Of note in the middle of the stream, Amir mentions that there will be a 2027 Dead By Sunrise Rarities release for Record Store Day. He mentions unreleased Chester song seeds from 2005 that were never developed, the 20 Eyes cover, and other rare tracks. He and Fu have been working on compiling songs to go through for this release for years, and it sounds like the reception from fans about the Out of Ashes anniversary release was quite positive, which included the acoustic live songs.

 

A big thank you to Ryan, Amir, Fu, and Galen for putting this together for fans!

[Vinescence]

47 minutes ago, LPLStaff said:

Of note in the middle of the stream, Amir mentions that there will be a 2027 Dead By Sunrise Rarities release for Record Store Day. He mentions unreleased Chester song seeds from 2005 that were never developed, the 20 Eyes cover, and other rare tracks. He and Fu have been working on compiling songs to go through for this release for years, and it sounds like the reception from fans about the Out of Ashes anniversary release was quite positive, which included the acoustic live songs.

 

A big thank you to Ryan, Amir, Fu, and Galen for putting this together for fans!

 

Ok, this is awesome! Can't wait!

[Soeffingnaive92]

Great news !!! 

[gorast]

Official DBS b-sides compilation...maybe there are still good things in the world. 

 

This is really cool, though. It's nice to see that Ryan and Amir are still so passionate about DBS without it feeling exploitative. 

[LPLStaff]

3 minutes ago, gorast said:

without it feeling exploitative. 

 

Really have always felt that way too. They are very authentic/genuine. Could listen to them talk about Chester and DBS all day, they are always so nice to fans and extremely respectful. Just total class. And have always wanted more music to come out.

[RentEznor]

31 minutes ago, gorast said:

without it feeling exploitative. 

 

Nailed it. Unlike certain other projects.

 

Wish DBS/OOA could've been released indepentently so it would've been easier for them to re-release even more material. As always sending all love and great vibes to Ryan, Amir and everyone involved with them, very appreciated of their time to do these sort of things for the fans and with the fans.

Edited 17 hours ago by RentEznor

[linkindan]

11 hours ago, LPLStaff said:

there will be a 2027 Dead By Sunrise Rarities release for Record Store Day.

How am I supposed to pay for this B̶r̶a̶d̶ Ryan, Amir, Fu, Galen?!

[rqthomazini]

I was thinking about those potential releases in 2027 and a question came to mind: could Dead by Sunrise ever come together to work on instrumentals over old, unreleased Chester demos?

 

You know, Ryan was a close friend of his and seems to have a good relationship with Talinda. Maybe at some point they could prepare a tribute by working on and releasing those songs. Years ago, I used to wonder about this in relation to Linkin Park, but nowadays it feels impossible. With Dead by Sunrise, though… you never really know, right?

[RayGun4200]

Wow this is pretty amazing seeing individual parts of Let Down, honestly can't wait for the 2027 release. But I wonder if we'll get more information about the Chester Bennington Demos CD, I've been wondering for years when that CD was dated and what not.

[AnsemTheWise]

45 minutes ago, rqthomazini said:

I was thinking about those potential releases in 2027 and a question came to mind: could Dead by Sunrise ever come together to work on instrumentals over old, unreleased Chester demos?

 

You know, Ryan was a close friend of his and seems to have a good relationship with Talinda. Maybe at some point they could prepare a tribute by working on and releasing those songs. Years ago, I used to wonder about this in relation to Linkin Park, but nowadays it feels impossible. With Dead by Sunrise, though… you never really know, right?

No offense but this is a garbage idea. This would be doing what Grey Daze did with the Wake Me and …No Sun Today albums. There is no point for them to do this. Out Of Ashes still sounds very modern and it’s honestly even OVER-produced. Ryan and Amir (and Fu) are doing this as a labor of love and to honor Chester and the fans, they have a lot of content to give us, demos, live stuff, seeds, etc. Amir mentions all of this during the stream but he’s also said it before as well. Ryan literally says in the video that they are doing this for the exact opposite reason of making money and re-recording new music to Chester’s vocals for Dead By Sunrise stuff would seem so cash-grabby and pointless. It defeats the entire purpose of giving us these demos and seeds, etc. The final album already exists and obviously Chester ans the guys were proud of it enough to put it out, it’s a totally different situation from the Grey Daze thing, but I didn’t even really agree with that anyways, nor did a lot of fans. They also now have a new singer and are ‘’touring’’, it’s become a joke, honestly, just my opinion. 
 

Anyways, this was a great live stream. Can’t wait to buy multiple copies of the release next year if it does happen!!! I’ve wanted this stuff for many, many years, even obsessed over it.

 

The breakdown of Let Down was awesome. Already knew most of the stories but some new things were learned in this stream, such as the fact that the first demo that they did hailed from March of 2005 (I thought it was a little earlier than that, awesome to find out), that Amir was against Howard doing a fade out on the album version of Let Down (I agree), and some other cool facts. 
 

I agree with Amir that the Let Down demo is special. Chester’s vocal is better honestly and you can hear the raw pain in his voice. Much like the REact Now performance. I also agree with Amir, I love the solo, best part of the song, especially on the demo going into the final chorus with Chester’s epic vocals. I can’t believe Howard wanted to cut it! Funny Chester told him no flat out. 
 

Honestly though, as we have heard some of the demos (leaked in 2018), I think Let Down might be the only better than the final version. I love all of the demos we have heard so far of course but there is no denying at least to me that Into You and Give Me Your Name sound better on the album, the vocals are 100 times better. The original Fire is cool but I think the final version is probably better. My Suffering was cool with the screaming verses that we all know, but the chorus and instrumentation is way better on the final version, IMO. Would have been cool to hear a version for the final album with those verses plus the improved chorus, etc. Walking In Circles, I love both versions we have a lot, but the final version is honestly better vocally. The demo is grittier and heavier but ultimately I like the final version, it’s one of my favorite songs of all time. I’d love to hear demos of the other songs (maybe not Inside Of Me and Condemned if they were written in 2008 like Chester said on the KROQ interview, but I’d welcome demos of those songs). I want to hear demos for End Of The World, Too Late, Crawl Back In. In The Darkness especially, I love that song, but I bet the final version is better, it’s amazing vocally and instrumentally. Can’t wait to have 20 Eyes released either!!! Hope it’s a different mix than the one we have but if not who cares. And awesome that Amir said there are song seeds of songs we don’t even know about, etc. I do hope we get the other demos shown on that famous song board pic that they posted on their website back in the day. From 2008, Ryan said Evil Twin was Condemned and Split Personality we already got from the band. Man this stuff is awesome. 2027 has the potential to be the best year of all time, with this release and hopefully MTM20!!!!

[AnsemTheWise]

11 minutes ago, RayGun4200 said:

Wow this is pretty amazing seeing individual parts of Let Down, honestly can't wait for the 2027 release. But I wonder if we'll get more information about the Chester Bennington Demos CD, I've been wondering for years when that CD was dated and what not.

 
The version that Julien-K played at the beginning of the stream is basically the same as that version we have, except for the drums, I think, maybe they are the same. Fu said it dated from March of 2005 and that was the first demo they made with Chester so besides Morning After I’d say all of these are from March-summer of 2005 as the band mentioned the summer of 2005 a lot, as well as in the last chat done about DBS. But they did work on stuff after the summer of 2005, even after the album was shelved in December 2005/early 2006, they still made stuff periodically, for example the Lincoln Car Ad Demo was from January of 2008. They did get back together to work on the album again after PR ‘08. They improved some songs and wrote some new songs (Split Personality, Inside Of Me and Condemned) and re-did Fire, My Suffering and Too Late (we saw the demo lyric sheet). 

[Trumtram]

A wild Geki appears. Again.