Fleur de Lys

I was excited about RTR too. In 2008... Almost 20 years ago. A lot of live releases with Chester in between then and now - I personally felt very little for them but I was hyped for studio albums. I don't see how this live album coming along with a film changes anything. I am definitely more excited to see the film than to listen to a concert I already saw two years ago. But fair enough if you are more checked out of LP 2.0. I am not, and I was still only mildly hyped for this live album. It's about managing expections. Eh. This is beautiful fantasy of online fans that Rob stepping back is to protest that it's not Chester... No confirmation on this. Mike even said that it was Rob who introduced Emily to him. I just don't see this in Rob's personality. Probably he is happy for the guys that they keep it going, but he just doesn't want that life anymore for himself.

Ask yourself. Were you super excited when A Thousand Suns Around The World dropped? One More Light: Live? Or is it because the Internet age made every show available including proshots, so you really long have seen everything there is to see? When Live in Texas came out there a good proshot of an LP concert wasn’t really available. I think it is unfair to expect a big feeling of hype for a live release in 2026.

I respect how honest LP is being with everything post-Emily. This was definitely not the best show instrumentally or for vocals. A lot of mistakes and Emily’s screaming voice was a little rough compared to other nights. They led with this honesty from the first night of the launch show. It’s pretty courageous, actually They pretty much just release it as is. They even left in quite a big drum mistake in one of the first songs. These things could just have easily been edited in from the second night or other shows. In contrast, Live In Texas was full of overdubs, especially the guitars. They sound very studio-recorded and that’s never how Brad played live. This is the opposite of that (RaR 2004 is overall a more honest representation of the band - on top of their game) From playing live shows myself as a musician, I will also say that some of the best shows are not necessarily the ones where everyone has the most clean performance. The overall vibe and crowd and energy can make a show stand out, and I have a feeling that this amazing crowd did exactly that. For the same reason, I like how loud the crowd is mixed. You can really feel the stadium, and I don’t mind at all Emily giving some of the chorus lines to them, it’s great. Overall, I think some songs were really special here. WFTE has maybe one of its best performances. OEO, LOATR and Lost sound great too. Some of the heavier songs have better versions from other shows of the From Zero tour. But I respect the honesty of them just rolling with this one.

The break is doing good by Emily's voice. She always nailed TEM but her distortion and pitch is so on point here.

My guess is... They will perform their biggest hits like In The End or Numb, maybe with a contestant. And then The Emptiness Machine on their own.

I actually think that is deliberate, the mix of that verse-guitar has been kind of low since the comeback. I think it's because of the higher tuning, it can sound a little more thin and grating on the ear, so it's more buried in the mix (I guess the same reason they took they highest synth note out of Lost In The Echo). For my tastes, it sounds good there

As a guitarist, I like the mix of SIB here. For years and years, live recordings always mixed Brad as sort of a lead guitar and then Mike's chords were barely audible. This is way closer to the album mix. Big, all-encompassing power chords that fill out the mix and then the octaves (Brad/Alex) make chord extensions on those power chords. It does sound a little off in the bridge though, where Alex's guitar should have been mixed higher. But it is still preferable to a lot of mixes of SOB throughout their career. Emily sounds amazing here. I love the grit and intensity. I think she scaled back on that and became more clean nowadays, maybe due to all the touring (still sounding great tho). Excited for the movie too! I do get fans pointing out that Unshatter is not on the setlist, but the name itself is obvious. LP shattered in 2017 and this movie shows the process of them "unshattering". Maybe some of the recording of the song will be shown in the movie too, because it seems like it was a pivotal moment in choosing Emily.

My personal pet peeve is when Emily starts the bridge of Numb with "but I know" instead of "and" - resulting in the awkward double "but I know, I may end up failing too. But I know..." Love Emily but those lines were written to make sense as a sentence lol

I really hope they start to incorporate With You into their sets and it wasn’t just a one-off. Would be a missed opportunity, bc the song adds a lot in terms of vibe and just variety. They should keep the intro too, it’s a cool and impactful moment, but probably the show has enough quite “breathers” already

Well I know this, but it is still telling that the material was so difficult to pull of other professional rock singers: the likes of M. Shadows, Taka from ONE OK ROCK, Jonathan Davis. Some of them were hard to listen to. It proves how difficult an LP show is to pull of every night (even was for Chester) and Emily is honestly doing an amazing job.

The truth is, Emily’s voice is one in a generation too. The way she delivers the chorus on The Emptiness Machine and similar parts is proof of an insanely rare level of talent. Like the chorus of Smells Like Teen Spirit-rare or Crawling-rare. I often remember back to the Chester tribute show. How much every single other vocalist was struggling with the material, how thin and unconvincing most choruses sounded. Emily can pull the material of convincingly. She can sing Crawling more powerful honestly than Chester could for like 20 years. Listen to the LANDMVRKS cover of Bleed It Out to see how cringe and unconvincing a lot of other singers sound on LP material - singers that people hail in the comments and say should replace Emily. Also, no keys are lowered? They are higher, because woman’s voices naturally sit one whole octave above men’s, but most songs keep the original key though. The explosive, screaming bridges were amazing with Chester, yes. But wouldn’t it also be annoying if someone literally outdid him every night? Those moments can remain Chester’s. But the real uncomfortable truth is, for 90% of the show, verses and raspy choruses, Chester was the one struggling with pitch and doing the raspy tone from the albums. Emily is very consistently good on these points. No chance that LP will ever change her out. It just won’t happen.

Emily's general tone is to die for, the way she delivers those choruses is just so full of tone, rasp and distortion in the right ways. I know LP loved her screaming for exactly not being the typical metalcore, generic, YouTube-lesson screaming. More of a hardcore yell, like some old 90's hardcore records. I respect that choice a lot. At the same time, nerdy as it is, I hope for LP that they do get her a screaming vocal coach. She sometimes falls into a very healthy, sustained way of screaming, that is not gonna damage her general tone. It's kind of frustrating, becuase it's clearly right there for her. She has the ability to do these things, she just needs to hone it. If she doesn't do this, and kind of just hopes for the best, I could see it damage her chords long term and thin out her general tone on the rest of the singing. That would be really sad. Anyway, of course I am just an arm chair expert here, but I've just seen it happen to a lot of my favorite vocalists over the years.

I think it is great they are finally changing the opening song, it's been over 2 years. We'll see if TEM will work better, I'll give it time. But maybe switching Papercut for SIB would also work, using the encore intro as an intro and vice versa... That would be huge energy from the start.

I agree that they chose exactly right with the released version of Let You Fade. It's feels special, original. I still would love to hear a more stripped down version too.

EDIT: Read your reply again. Actually pretty precise so forget it