blackout

I don't want to start the third world war here. I'm a huge Linkin Park fan and I am and will be excited by anything they are going to release. Mike has been my biggest inspiration in music and life for around 13 or 14 years now. However, I'm not sure if I myself would pick new music over old unreleased songs with Chester. Don't get me wrong, but if LP decides to go on with Mike as the only vocalist, most of the band's stuff will be hugely similar to Post Traumatic. It is an amazing album in my opinion, but it doesn't have as much LP feeling as the stuff with Chester on vocals. There is something about Chester's voice mixed with Mike's production that creates that LP feeling. Obviously now that Chester's passed away we won't get any new music with this combination of musical elements, but what I'm trying to say is that I am personally waiting for Friendly Fire or other unreleased songs with Chester's voice more than for the new album from them. I want the band to come back, I'm going to support them no matter what, but I'm just comparing these two things. Lost is a typical Linkin Park song with a style that I can't get enough of. I'm almost certain that something will be lacking in the new LP music. Even if there were songs on the previous albums that had Mike as the lead vocalist, there would be other songs that had Chester as the main vocalist. It created interesting dynamics. We won't turn back time, obviously, and there will not be any new music with Chester. It's time to move on, but Linkin Park's releases will probably be never as exciting as it used to be. Don't get me wrong - I am waiting very eagerly for new music from Mike and possibly LP; I'm just comparing two different eras of the band's existence. I'm not sure if I conveyed well what I wanted to say. I hope I did 😀

Now I agree. It's all about wording only. I understood your first post as "Mike edited these demos" meaning "he changed them, added new sounds and re-recorded some parts" and that's why I didn't agree. However, yeah, it's true that he admitted in the interview that these demos/unreleased songs aren't just exported tracks that they simply put in the boxset but he actually picked the best versions of the vocal recordings and all that stuff. I believe that for some of these songs this was necessary. Mike had a version of Fighting Myself with no chorus so he had to add it somehow for the song to sound full. Considering that the band's manager had some multitracks, Mike had comfort to choose the best recording of the chorus, for instance. For a listener, this minor editing doesn't change anything but the final product certainly benefited from it. I'm glad that Mike didn't change the songs completely, making them sound like something from, for example, One More Light. I'm a big fan of this album but I feel like significantly changing these demos from Meteora era would make them sound really unauthentic. It's not something that I think Mike would do, I'm just speculating. BTW, I'm not arguing with you in any way, just discussing the topic that we are both interested in.

Are you sure? I understood Mike in a completely different way. I listened to the interview today and I think that he meant that he didn't do anything with these demos. Obviously, they are newly mixed and mastered but he said that he hadn't added anything new, hadn't re-recorded his verses in these songs and in general, had tried to keep everything as authentic as possible. He even said that the demos had been created in 2003 and there was no point in changing them up completely. When it comes to Fighting Myself, I believe that he wanted to say that he just hadn't had the version with the chorus which he had to add from another version of the demo which the band's manager had found.

Good Goodbye is awesome, I agree. The beat is fire and I like Mike's and guests' verses. Obviously, it's not a fully serious song but I don't have a problem with that. To be fair, the band had a lot of solemn tracks over the years. It's not my favourite song of all time but I enjoy it very much.

After listening to the song a few times, I can say that... it's awesome! I absolutely love the verses and choruses. They sound fresh, almost like they were recorded last year. My favourite part of the song is the beginning of the second verse, Chester sang the lyrics "I'm tired..." perfectly, in such an emotional way, wow! I'm impressed. The chorus is powerful and catchy. I also enjoy the style of this song - it sounds like a mix of Meteora, Living Things and One More Light and that's something that I didn't expect for sure. I think it might be an effect of the mix that the band decided to do specifically for Meteora 20. It sounds modern, not like a track from 2002. I wonder how the original mix from Meteora sessions sounds like - maybe we'll get it one day I'm not a big fan of the intro. I wish there was something more atmospheric. The bridge is weird but I see that the band was aiming for something memorable and repetitive that would work well at the live shows. I wish we could hear the song live, at least once All in all, it's a great song that I am going to listen to over and over again. It's good to hear Chester again. It's good to hear some 'new' Linkin Park music. I'm excited for what's to come!

A few days ago, in the second topic related to Meteora 20, I wrote that for me the band wanted to achieve "the full album feeling". The Lost Demos CD may be like Meteora in the alternative universe. Maybe I'll be right. I hope I'll be! You can read my theory in the second topic if you're interested.

I have a strange feeling that the band has wanted the Lost Demos to resemble the structure of the original Meteora album. That's why my prediction is that Wesside is an instrumental and Resolution is a song with vocals, similarly to how Session and Numb are juxtaposed on Meteora. It seems odd to me that on the tracklist there are have two unreleased tracks after all of these demo versions of known songs, hence my prediction. Probably the entire Lost Demos CD won't resemble the sequencing of Meteora and we'll get one or two more instrumentals on it (the titles such as Massive or Healing Foot sound like instrumentals, for instance). However, I think that the band's wanted to achieve the "full album feeling" with this CD. I hope I'm right, I would love Resolution to be an alternative to Numb. Maybe there will be a typical stripped-down ballad? There are no such songs on Meteora but we don't know what they came up with while working on the album. She Couldn't sounds like nothing from HT so anything is possible, to be fair. I would love to hear an epic ballad with soft Chester's vocals. Well, time will tell!

I'm really excited for all of this! It's great that we are getting four new proshots and all these amazing unreleased demos. The box is a bit expensive, to be fair. I have to think about whether to buy it or not. It's really tempting, for sure! 😁 If the option with three CDs had Lost Demos CD, I would probably buy this version.

They put this video on purpose, for sure! I noticed it too. For me it's almost a confirmation that this track is going to be on Meteora 20. They are teasing us again 😁 I wonder if it will be a track with vocals or just instrumental. I wouldn't have anything against either of these options. I just want to finally have this track in the official version and not as a fan remake. I don't know if I am not waiting for this demo more than even for "Lost". Especially if it has vocals, wow! This piano melody is mesmerising and imagine if it comes on after a beautiful vocal melody. I am going to lose my shit when I finally hear this song and if it is with vocals. I cannot wait!

So the reason is that it'd been prohibited before martinez put the leak out, right? Why was it allowed yesterday then? Do you know that the official thing is coming this week?

@martinez If I can ask of course... If you don't want to answer, just don't answer. Why have you decided to put the leak out right now if you'd had this info in December? Do you know that LP are going to officially announce it soon and that's why you did it or there is a different reason? Just out of curiosity. 😉

Perhaps it will get the same treatment and they simply won't release RTR. They have a lot of proshots to choose from when it comes to MTM era so it shouldn't be a problem. Obviously maybe I'm wrong and both CC and RTR will be released again.

I wouldn't be surprised if CC was excluded from the release. Maybe dealing with Jay-Z's label is still troublesome and the band and Warner have decided to just ignore the existence of the EP instead of having problems with releasing CC again.

Wow, this is amazing news! I cannot wait to hear Lost and other demos - I'm especially intrigued by Fighting Myself. The title just sounds good! I don't know what else to say - I'm waiting for the official confirmation which should come this week, I believe. I am excited as hell 😁

I really like the track! Typical old-school Linkin Park style - it sounds like a demo that would be created between Meteora and Minutes to Midnight. It's also awesome that he added some modern flavour to the typical Linkin Park style with these 808s here and there in the verses. I can see the band utilising a similar style moving forward, IF they move forward, of course. Great song!

I've just watched the video. Cool and rare stuff! I've noticed that during this Papercut Jam Mike was playing the chords of "Heavy". Is it possible he had some kind of a demo back in 2014 or is it just a coincidence? Probably some chords that he just came up with on the spot.

The mix in the proshot of Rock Werchter was awful. The sound was so muddy and badly balanced in general. I avoid watching this proshot because of this, unfortunately.

It was great anyway, in my opinion. One of my favourite live shows proshots.

2017 would be definitely Southside Festival. One of the best LP live shows I have watched. I come back to it from time to time. Great energy, the band was on form in general.

I think that we don't really know what Joe or Phoenix or whoever did on which album. I'm almost sure that Joe's contribution to THP was still big. When they were making OML, I believe that Mike said that him and Joe were going through tons of sounds to incorporate them into the songs. No scratching doesn't mean that Joe was not involved. The roles of each band member has been changing with each album-making process. I think that Joe is responsible for creating sounds for songs, finding interesting samples to put in the tracks, maybe coming up with the arrangement stuff, etc. His role is not limited to scratching or doing "DJ stuff". It's similar to Brad's situation. I remember when ATS was released, people said that "Brad is doing nothing on this album, THERE IS NO GUITAR". The truth is that Brad is not supposed to play guitar only but he helps with production and do a lot of things that we are not even aware of. It's always funny for me when people say that Session is Joe's song, just because it's the only instrumental track on the album and includes a lot of scratching. For me it's obvioust that it's a typical Mike's Meteora-era work for which Joe added his scratching. Not everything is as obvious as people think and each member is not attached to his instrument only - they contributed to all of the albums in a variety of ways.

First of all, I would like to say that I like the song very much. I love the production on this, the track sounds excellent. The rap verses are dope and the chorus is catchy. I probably enjoy it the most from all MS songs released after Post Traumatic. I'm sure I'll listen to it frequently. However, I understand people who don't like it. Mike's trying hard to follow all the trends - I'm not accusing him of anything, just my observation. It's okay though as I think I'm similar in that case. For example, I like trap-rap route many pop artists take now and try to incorporate it in my music as well to some degree. It's exciting to make very "modern" and "trendy" track, it's something that music producers want to do. I'm also very anti-genre in general - if the song is enjoyable for me, I listen to it. I've also observed an interesting discussion about Mike's losing his track with the music he releases. Well, if he finds it the right way now, I don't have a problem. Still, I need to admit that I believed that he was creating something behind the curtain and had a more specific idea. His comments from yesterday are nothing wrong but a little bit disappointing, at least for me. I like Mike in his "album mood", definitely. However, I understand that he wants to try something different and be "more free" when it comes to realasing and creating stuff. When LP is not active, I even think that it's a right track. I just hope that it's not a sign of him losing his drive in general.

Thanks, I'm glad you like it.

Thanks!

Back in the day, I loved WFTE->Blackout and Blackout->W&K on A Thousand Suns. It is still a fantastic trio for me, but I don't have any explanation for that. Now when I think about this, my favourite would be probably Papercut->OSC. Both are iconic LP songs, and there is that specific sound at the end of Papercut that always makes me want to hear One Step Closer. When it comes to other albums, I very much enjoy One More Light to Sharp Edges on OML. One of the saddest song LP has ever written is followed by one of the most uplifting songs I have ever heard. Sharp Edges is like the ultimate acknowledgment of the past and mistakes within it. It has a nostalgic vibe and I'm glad that the band put it as a closer on the album because it really fits there, in my opinion - especially after Chester's death. I can't come up with anything more. Maybe honourable mentions would go to Final Masquerade->ALITS, The Catalyst-> The Messenger, In Pieces->TLTGYA and APFMH->Forgotten.

It's up on Spotify already: https://open.spotify.com/album/6N2WfLgBPl7LBg6lUbw1AV