The Requiem: mike commentary
That first track, “The Requiem,” is actually made up of sounds that you’re about to hear on the album. There’s a Juno pad that appears a little bit in that that also appears in “Journada Del Muerto,” and the pad is the main pad underneath “Blackout.”
Blackout :
We have a song called “Blackout” that we got a scat vocal for, but every time we tried to write words, it sounded terrible. So Rick suggested we try automatic writing. He said, “Do you know what that is?” I said, “No.” He said, “I’ve tried it with Tom Petty and Johnny Cash and Neil Young.”
So naturally you gave it a go?
Mike Shinoda: (Laughs) I’m like, “That’s a good start. How do I do it?” He said basically, I want you to walk up to the mic and start pretending you know the words. Any words that come to mind, let them fall out and that will ho
pefully let you know what the part needs to be. You’re going to start finding words that fit. There’s a few songs on the record that we never wrote the words down for. Like I’m still finding myself having to figure them out because we just got up to the mic and started putting stuff down.
http://www.examiner.com/article/linkin-par...a-thousand-suns
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Mike talking about Living Things
''It doesn’t lose any of the creativity of the newer stuff and it brings in the energy of the older stuff. It’s kind of a comprehensive sound. I feel like we’ve been able to take all the stuff we’ve learned on the way and put it all together in each song and still keep it fresh and forward-thinking.
Whenever we get in the studio we react really badly to anything feeling like it’s a throwback or a repeat of what we’ve done—as long as it feels like we’re taking a step forward it feels good. This record echoes a lot of different random things from what we’ve learned along the way. I think every artist’s “new album” is their favorite one.
We’ve been immersed in this one for a year. It’s like we are currently in the eye of the storm. All of my focus is on getting this record perfect and presenting it to the fans in the way that I think is the perfect way. It’ll never be perfect, but we just do our best to make it the best it can be. I’m thrilled about the record, I couldn’t be more excited about people hearing it.''
http://www.complex.com/music/2012/04/inter...s-top-5-rappers