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Review of A Thousand Suns

ana

By ana
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ana

ana

Posted
Posted (edited)

ATS Pre-listening.

 

We entered a room with chairs and a couch where obviously Mike and Phoenix will sit.

They handed us wireless in-ear headphones so we could listen to ATS all on our own (the band wasnt there while we where listening to the album)

I won't say too much about the songs because I dont want to spoil it but what I can tell you is that you are going to be shocked.

 

Side Note: I couldnt clearly say when it was a new song, because they didnt pause to tell us the name and you hardly can hear it.

 

 

#1:

You can clearly say that It's a journey through an apocalyptical athmosphere and it's starting with a mysterious sound, similar to aliennoises and builds up into a keyboard play. This track is featuring a Choir and a female voice singing "Don't save us everyone, we are broken people living under loaded gun.." and ends with an original, digitally edited speech by Oppenheimer.

 

 

#2:

The second song begins with an heartbeat drum and is followed by a electric/pop guitar and Mike singing. The keyboard sounded like electro mixed with jazz elements and after that they sing "I'm loosing what I don't deserve" and the guitars fade out and you can only hear the keys and mike singing the end.

 

 

#3:

Starts with crickets and bombs in the background and later you can hear afican soldier marchsinging.

There is a sudden break in the song and a heavy distorted guitar fades in (I've never heard Brad playing such heavy guitars before) and a heavy rap rythm drops in.

Mike raps: "I'm not a robot, I'm not a monkey....."

And on this Linkin Park record, you hear Mike saying motherf**** for the first time ever (2x in the song) and what comes after that swearing is a perfect part for the crowd to sing (Ohhh's in the rythm to the heavy beat -> sounds like soldiers preparing for war)

It ends with chester singing: "When they come for me, I'll be gone" and the same african soldier marchsinging as the beginning (it also features some oriental music)

 

 

#4:

Starts with a Piano and Mike and Chester singing Ohhh

The genre reminds me of Soundgarden, older rock style

Chester singing "You say you're not gonna fight because no one's gonna fight for you"

And on this song (and also on the whole album) you can hear synthesizer strings and a similar fast drum beat as on the previous songs.

"Hold on to the weight of the world" is one of the main messages of this song.

 

#5:

Mike and Chester singing in another language (or english backwards) and followed by a guitar distortion and a drum beat in WID style.

It builds up slowly and fades out into an empty space.

 

 

#6:

Rough Guitar Intro (repeats 4x) followed by single key notes and on this track Mike is rapping in a reggae style but still fitting to the guitars. Another break fades in where it calms the speed of the song down and chester sings: "Waiting for the end to come"

A ballad tunes in and the whole song has a cruising (californian beach style) rythm )

* A song you can actually dance pretty well to it in the club*

 

 

#7: (WORST SONG)

Its starts with a synth organ pipe and is underlined with a fast drumroll. This song reminded me of the 80th Pop style with the cheap synthesizer keys but the most shoking was chester rapping the song really fast and (to me) awful.

And you think this song is going to be POP with Chester rapping, but in the chorus he screams his lungs out (Mike mentioned in an interview that he's loosing his mind)

This song is really weird and disturbing because the pop/rapping (autotuned) by chester don't fit at all to these crazy screams.

 

 

#8:

When the guitar fades in, it reminded me of a electro-rock/trash song by Marylin Manson and the beat was dubstep like.

And the song has a really fast speed but its being calmed down by mike singing in a soft voice "calm down" and it ends with another singing by Mike and Chester together.

We all somehow messed the tracklist up but I can cleary tell you

 

 

#10: Wretches and Kings

Starts with a public speech (obviously from the WWII era)

The guitar sounds very strange and the beats style is similar to the 2009 Lying From You Intro.

Mike is rapping on this one and chester sings with a very dirty (similar to skindred) voice and its another perfect song for the crowd to sing. On this track Joe is really present.

 

 

#11(must be wisdom justice and war)

A very sad keyboard intro with a historical speech by Martin Luther King. An unknown male voice says "the end is near" and turns slowly (by effects) to an evil-like voice.

(At the end you can hear MLK saying wisdom, justice and war)

 

 

 

#12: Iridiscent

Starts (again) with a piano to which mike sings in a sad voice (very emotional)

Chester joins Mike to it and the beat is similar to a one republic song (marching on)

-> To me it's a Pop Ballad (similar to SOTD) <-

The song ends with a choir by the whole band.

 

 

#13: Fallout

(reminds me of the song Buddha For Mary by 30 Seconds to mars -> the beginning with the distorted voice)

 

 

#14:

The Catalyst.

 

#15: The Messenger

Very similar to Hero Of War by Rise Against

Acoustic Guitar with chester singing: "When you feel you're alone, your instinct tells you to run.."

(I marked that chester became angrier with his voice)

The piano follows the acoustic guitar and chester repeats "Back home, where live/love keeps you blind...)

 

 

I'm really sorry that I can't remember everything really well and that I messed up the beginning but it was really difficult to hear whenever a new song is played.

About the guitar:

The guitar is mostly in the background, and has a lot of effects (Flanger, Disortion) but sounds totally different from MTM, HT and Meteora. Sometimes the whole beat stops and you can only hear the guitar.

About the singing:

 

With this album you say that Mike is the lead singer, and chester just the second voice. Because most of the time they sing the songs together (30% autotune) and on only 1 song chester is singing all alone.

About the album:

 

This album is mostly a new Fort Minor album featuring Linkin Park record. The drums sound all electronic and hip hop like, there is a lot of different percussion (e.g bushdrums) and as I mentioned before Mike is much more present than Chester.

Chester only screams 2x.

 

My personal statement:

This album totally blew my mind off. It doesnt sound like Linkin Park at all. If you carefully listen to all the remixes Mike has done (and also the intros of WID/Ambulance, LFY) you could compare this style to the new album.

 

Linkin Park risks a lot with this totally different direction and fans will either love it or hate it.

I do like it, and you cant tell the genre because it features so many. It sounds like:

Soundgarden, Muse, Metric, 30 Seconds To Mars, Rise Against, Dr.Dre, Eminem, Pendulum, Dubstep, Electronica etc. etc.

 

 

I hope this review didnt confuse you too much. It is really really hard to describe the new album and I can't compare it to a specific style.

 

 

edit: length ~50mins

Edited by ana
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Geki

Geki

Posted
Posted

I love the idea of the interludes and speeches and stuff. It's really fucking cool IMO. And I love the 'african soldier drumbeat' and the crazy screaming chorus. I think that Jornada Del Muerto will not be in English, as stated above.

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Geki

Geki

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Posted

i didn't liked this idea, seems weird, i don't have a good feeling about this :(

 

That was actually one of my favorite parts that I read, I've always been interested in war and history and the whole theme of this album sounds amazing. I will definitely enjoy it more than MTM.

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m03pchen

m03pchen

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Posted (edited)

I don't know..

 

Pls dont expect toooo much guys.. i can not describe what i heard today.. need to listen a second and third time..

 

till now - after listening the first time - i can only say:

 

way too much scratching, sometimes.. long outros, too much speeches..

Edited by m03pchen
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Ree

Ree

Posted
Posted

I don't know..

 

Pls dont expect toooo much guys.. i can not describe what i heard today.. need to listen a second and third time..

 

till now - after listening the first time - i can only say:

 

way too much scratching, sometimes.. long outros, too much speeches..

is there any specific songs you liked/didn't like?

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LPFreak64

LPFreak64

Posted
Posted (edited)

For more insight to each song, I went back and grabbed the 6-song sampler review to cross review each song. Link: http://lplive.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=4869

 

This is what I could guess from each review.

 

Ana's #2 = Sampler's #5

Ana's #3 or #10 - Wretches and Kings = Sampler's #2

Ana's #4 = Sampler's #1

Ana's #6 = Sampler's #3

Ana's #12 - Iridescent or #13 - Fallout = Sampler's #4

Ana's #14 - The Catalyst = Sampler's #6 - The Catalyst

 

This is all, IMO, so if you think otherwise, please point it out.

Edited by LPFreak64
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Malvar

Malvar

Posted
Posted (edited)

This sounds all exciting and I can't wait. The only bit I'm not too sure about is the auto tune. I didn't think the band was one for using auto tune, surely they are better than that. I remember in Mike's blog he said he was against it.

Agreed, and the guitar solo, that i didn't noticed on review Edited by Malvar
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