blackout

Didn't Mike say that the tour is off the table? He said that the fans might expect something from LP but not touring. Where did you take this rumour from? I guess an EP or a single are more likely to come later this year.

Wow! I bought it from a Polish store and they told me that I'd probably get it on the 7th of April. I hope I won't get it in May. My plan is to listen to all the tracks for the first time from the official CD. I don't want to wait until May to listen to the Lost Demos... I hope it's just Amazon and not all distributors.

I couldn't resist and I bought the Super Deluxe Box Set today! I'm sure I won't regret it and forget about the price soon. Maybe I will buy a record player one day? I've really wanted the DVDs and CDs. I cannot say no to Linkin Park...

I think it will be difficult to find the DVDs online, right? They will probably leak in around half a year after the release at the earliest. Well, also if I watch and listen everything online without buying then I won't have any reasons to buy the boxset. I'd buy it for the content not for the box itself.

Thank you all for the contribution! It's not stupid at all. I'm in a similar situation. I'd love to have something related to Meteora20 but at the same time I don't really care about vinlys as I don't have a record player. That's why I'm thinking about buying the 3CD version. It sucks that they didn't include at least the Lost Demos CD. The best solution would be CD+DVD edition. I'd buy it straight away. What I would really like to watch immediately after the release is the live shows and it sucks that if I buy the 3CD edition, I will have to search for it on the internet 😂 It'd be great to have the deluxe boxset to have everything but let's be honest, I'd mostly pay for something that I wouldn't use (vinyls, for example) and only the small amount of money spent is on something that I really want (CDs, DVDs and the book). When it comes to your situation with Amends Super Deluxe, I think it's a bit similar for me with HT20. I bought the deluxe boxset but I rarely use something from it. I have watched all DVDs once, read the book twice. Sometimes I listen to the CDs. I still don't know. I'd like to listen to the original CDs, watch DVDs and simply have it but I don't if the amount of money spent is justifiable in any way.

I have a hard time deciding whether to buy the Meteora20 boxset or not. I'd like to have it in a way but the price is so high... I feel like the money won't be spent on anything useful. I don't have a record player so vinyls are useless for me (maybe I will buy one in the future but it's rather unlikely). I'd love to have all DVDs and CDs, especially the live shows and the Lost Demos CD, however I'm not sure if these two elements justify spending so much money. Especially that the whole album will be on Spotify and the DVDs will sooner or later leak onto YouTube. I bought the Hybrid Theory boxset but it was cheaper. If I don't buy the biggest boxset, I am definitely going to buy the 3CD version. That's why I created a poll with different options to see how many people have decided to buy one of the smaller versions. I'd like to see what's your perspective on the problem. Are you going to buy it simply because it's Linkin Park and "I don't care about money" or have you had some doubts about spending money on it?

Great to hear that! 😄 I agree with that 100%

I probably like it a bit more than the official music video. I am not a huge fan of neither of the versions but this one is kinda cool. Meteora vibes are more palpable here. In the official video I don't like it that there are a lot of stuff included that is completely unrelated to Meteora like New Divide or Fine music videos. It ruins the experience for me. Also, the scenes in which Chester is presented singing are out of sync comparing to the vocals. These are two main reasons I don't like the official video. Here there are no such problems as it shows more aspects such as Meteora art design and the band's members in photoshoots, etc. I don't know why it focuses so much on Mike though, probably just an AI thing. Summing up, I would say that I don't like neither of the videos but this one is more tolerable in general.

It feels so surreal to even think about this, right? As I said, I hope I will be alive when it drops; you never know what the future holds.

I think that OML20 will be huge. Not because it's one of my favourite albums from the band... Remember that for this album they started all the songs with lyrics and vocals. That means that they must have tons of stuff with vocals recorded. We know about Friendly Fire, which is a finished song, but there are many titles that we know that for sure have vocals and must have been more developed because they appeared on the boards in photos - titles like Out of Reach, Can We Go Back and others that we discovered. We know that for Meteora20 we'll have some instrumental songs on the Lost Demos CD (probably Massive and Healing Foot). On LPU CDs we had a lot of insturmental stuff because this was the element of songs that they started with. Some songs did not go far enough in the process to have the vocals recorded for them. When it comes to OML, however, even initial and raw demos should have some kind of vocal ideas. It is visible how huge the hype is for songs like More the Victim or Fighting Myself and for new stuff with vocals in general. For OML20 we probably will get a full CD with new songs with vocals and this is so exciting for me. It sucks that I will be old when it is released. I hope I will be still alive! 😄

As I wrote in the chatbox earlier today, I really liked the interview. It was something different than the most usual stuff. Stern put forward many interesting topics. However, I don't like the fact that he was implying all the time that Chester had been difficult to deal with. Mike denied a few times but Stern continued with his own line of thought anyway. Obviously, Chester had its problems, everybody knows that, but I cannot imagine that because of his addictions or dark past he wasn't a likeable person. I'm sure he was. Same with this question about the concerts that were ruined because of Chester's addiction - I've watched a lot of LP live shows and he always went all out on stage. Surely, he was in worse condition sometimes, but it's understandable after so many years of screaming and singing songs like Crawling. However, I totally agree with some of you who mentioned that by some fans Chester is portrayed as a perfect angelic person. This is cringey, I agree. In a sense, I like the way that Stern presented him. Everybody has their highs and lows and Chester had a lot of lows, for sure. I liked the question about Stone Temple Pilots as well. The interview kind of showed a more humane face of the band. They've all had their problems and concerns and they haven't agreed on everything all the time. Everybody always asks safe questions. It was good to listen to something different at last. Well, I still believe that some of the questions were a bit annoying, but whatever.

The quality of Fighting Myself is not good enough for me to express my opinion about the song. I will do it when it officialy drops. I can properly hear only the first verse and a half of the first chorus. I don't want to ruin my impression of the song so I will try not to listen to this radio recording at all until the release. From what I can hear, it's great. I'm not sure if there is ever going to be a Linkin Park song that I fully dislike so it was totally expected that I would like this one as well. It seems heavy, the vocals by Chester are raw and energetic. I don't know if it's a matter of quality only but I like it a bit less than More the Victim, but as I said, I will judge it when it officialy drops. More the Victim. Well, I'm impressed... The instrumental is awesome, sounds so full - beautiful at times, sometimes heavy. I cannot wait to hear it in high quality. The pre-chorus sung by Chester is heavenly. I love all the changes that they made from Cumulus. The scratches are fun, the strings add another layer of sounds which fits the instrumental perfectly and the drums... well, the drums! I don't know exactly why this element of the song got my attention but I love Rob's drumming in this song. Rob's work on this track is perfect. It's awesome how he slightly changed the drumbeat in the last chorus. The transitions... Wow, the drums add so much to the track. It is probably not technically complicated, but it sounds amazing and that's enough for me to appreciate it. A lot of great ideas here and there. In general, I like More the Victim more than some of the tracks on Meteora. I'd probably swap it with Hit the Floor or Nobody's Listening. I don't know if I like the song more than Lost but it's really, really good. One piece of criticism that I have towards both songs are that they are a bit formulaic. I understand that the band came up with some kind of a structure for songs on Meteora but it's a bit repetitive and predictable at times. It's the thing that made Linkin Park recognisable so I don't have anything against this formula, I like it in general. But come on, in (almost) every song?! 😂

There are added scratches, beautiful strings in the background (however, they are barely audible due to the bad quality of the recordings) and, most importantly, live drums! It sounds much better than the demo.

What a weird move. "Lost" hype isn't over yet and they want to give us two new songs today.

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. 😉