Astat

LOL, you guys...this is so much better than Heavy, it's laughable that any of you would put it in the same league. "Could've made this in ten minutes?" SERIOUSLY? There's so much stuff going on in this song I don't even know where to begin. The vocal production on this may not be as dense as Heavy, but there's a ton more going on instrumentally. Lots of layered keyboard and guitar sounds, that main stuttering loop thing sounds like a vocal idea that had a ton of work done to it, I'm pretty sure those are live strings in the buildup to the last chorus...not to mention how many variations on percussion sounds there are in different spots. Just because it's pop doesn't mean it's easy...production-wise, this is seriously one of the most ambitious things Linkin Park has ever released. Chester sounds way better on this than he does on Heavy. The melody is better than Heavy. The chord progression actually changes at some points, unlike Heavy. This song actually has a proper intro and ending, unlike Heavy. If One More Light has a song like this on it, Heavy should've been a throwaway co-write for Kiiara's next album where she could just sing the whole song, because a song like that has no business sharing space on an album with something as vastly superior as this. This should've been the first single, but yay for popstar guest spots taking priority over songwriting... My biggest criticism of this song is that the lyrical idea seems really disjointed, like it's a bunch of sort-of-related ideas stitched together to form a song, but it doesn't sound like a consistent narrative the whole way through. Seems like something that would normally go through some lyrical re-writes. In that regard, I can agree with some of the "sounding like a demo" comments, although I doubt that's the context most of those comments were made in to begin with. Heavy is one of the worst tracks in the Linkin Park catalog. If Heavy's like a 2 out of 10, this song's easily a 7. Still hung up on the idea that a singular quote made in reference to the thought process behind the creation of a single album should somehow be considered a binding contract not to make a particular kind of music ever at any point in the future, huh? I don't see you bitching about Wastelands existing despite the "throw out everything that sounds like Hybrid Theory/Meteora" comments made in reference to the writing process for A Thousand Suns...oh wait, Wastelands has big heavy guitarzzzzz, so it should be put on a pedestal and be immune to criticism. I see.

Corrected lyrics for Fiends: (Always prevail, the human third rail) Yo, yo (Exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) Junkyard Scientific, Styles, haha (Always prevail, the human third rail) Yo, I thought you knew, I thought, ha, uh (Exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) I tell ya, ha, uh It's like a royal flush, a rush when I bust verbally Plus crush Earth's crust and enemy emcees to dust, with one touch Stonehenge rhyme riddle a mystery With Earth-rattle reckoning, rewriting your history With blistery flesh, meshed with a mess of a civil unrest on wax Test pressed, scratched with finesse and next Blessed with extra-terrestrial techs and programmed for the organs above your necks Undressing hip hop and making it over again This is the end, ill men you'll never defend From the deep end we watch trends and then we see rock And devise plans, strand them in the penalty box To mentally stop brains of virtual train wrecks Dissect the picture to the words turned up by the text What's next? Heat seeking treats meet your sect When you spit a thousand words and haven't painted a stroke yet Believe this, I'm only in it for the fiends And mean every single sentence that I scream It's just the sound as the breakbeat kicks That's got us all dancing in the mist Believe this, I'm only in it for the fiends And mean every single sentence that I scream It's just the sound as the breakbeat kicks That's got us all dancing in the mist With your incomphrehensible bullet-hole ventilators Stainless steel metal invincible diamond and platinum-plated Psychologically fabricated facade godsent and hellbent Are mentally not making any sense to me Eventually you tempted me to put you on the chopping block As a sacrifice to hip-hop when I knock you off A razor blade and pop and lock the axe in Put your head in a basket as an example for those who pass it Medievally approaching these festivities Jump around frequently when you see me, like BDP on PCP Frequently me and Mark transform like DMC To soundwaves of song set in every frequency (Always prevail, the human third rail) Endlessly worthless, crying out your curses (Exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) Playing all these games and turning this into a circus (Always prevail, the human third rail) Witless, worthless, crying out your curses (Exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) Playing all these games... Believe this, I'm only in it for the fiends And mean every single sentence that I scream It's just the sound as the breakbeat kicks That's got us all dancing in the mist Believe this, I'm only in it for the fiends And mean every single sentence that I scream It's just the sound as the breakbeat kicks That's got us all dancing in the mist (Always prevail, the human third rail, I exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) One two, one, one, yeah, one two (Always prevail, the human third rail, I exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) Ha, ha, ha, Cash Double-Oh, Xero, 818, you know? That's how we do (Always prevail, the human third rail, I exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) Xero, 818, you know? That's how we do (Always prevail, the human third rail, I exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails) Yeah, check it out, y'all, check it out, Cash Double-Oh Tell your grandparents, tell your brother and sister, tell everybody, ha One two, ha, ha, one two, ha, one two Just like that Yo, can you hear me? ------------ Corrections/references/notes: -Lots of stuff was missing on this originally - the bridge was completely absent, as were a lot of the ad-lib/sampled parts. Lots of little corrections here and there too, mainly a couple things on the chorus and a lot of the first verse being in past tense. -The "Always prevail, the human third rail, I exhale the smoke from Molotov cocktails" sampled line comes from 007's verse on Spies Like Us by Styles of Beyond. -Not 100% sure on the "pop and lock the axe in" line but it definitely ends with "the axe in." -The much-debated PCP line is "like BDP on PCP." BDP refers to legendary hip-hop group Boogie Down Productions. -"DMC" refers to Run DMC, obviously. -"Cash Double-Oh" is another name for 007 (this name is also mentioned before his verse in Spies Like Us). -Mike and 007 are both ad-libbing at the same time over the outro, so a lot of stuff is hard to hear but I included as much as I could make out. -007 appears during the intro and outro, in addition to his sampled lines. Mark does backups on the chorus and I think I hear him in a few other spots too.

Corrected lyrics for Drop (still working on Fiends): Hi We're back Kenji, Artofficial Rapology 13 Why do these people have to get in my way? I'm losing more and more pity for idiots every day Say what you want about my outlook, I'm pessimistic But you're the one who watches Jerry Springer's guests with their shit schtick Just the other day, I saw my neighbor on the show Cause her crack-smoking kids were fucking a dog when she came home from work And it was her bestiality videotapes and crack rock that gave them all the ideas in the first place Not even worst case scenario, it's everywhere I turn Rap records still coming out talking about how they got money to burn And Joe can't get his turntables fixed And this hunchback repair man with a hairlip is a fucking lunatic When all we gotta do is fix the AC cord that blew out And this dude's charging us seventy-two bucks to take the screws out (that's ridiculous) I'm fed up and I'm doing all I can do to move to a deserted island And make my own shit out of coconuts and bamboo The world's nothing but a can full of idiots The world's nothing but a basket full of stupids The world's nothing but a bucket full of morons I don't wanna talk to you so don't look at me The world's nothing but a can full of idiots The world's nothing but a basket full of stupids The world's nothing but a bucket full of morons I don't wanna talk to you so don't look at me Now I'm starting to think that Kaczynski fella had a good point My grandpa's popping Valium and Viagra, smoking joints Cause the doctor said it would cure his anxiety attacks But the reason he's so anxious is he's doing all that smack And my cousin Pete the phone sex freak went to Vegas with one of the operators And she drove off in his Mercedes And he went around town alone and he gambled all his cheddar Now he and Grandpa sit at home and shoot heroin together But that's what happens in a world of hedonists and heretics Teachers get paid less than cops and psychotherapists Cause it's pretty damn important to give you a ticket for a headlight So you can get home safe and visit Charles Manson's website Or see the shrink to get your head right Or get on the road and get hit by a slobbering drunk driver running a red light Or get murdered by Mr. Green in the alley with a lead pipe Or sing the chorus because it's alright The world's nothing but a can full of idiots The world's nothing but a basket full of stupids The world's nothing but a bucket full of morons I don't wanna talk to you so don't look at me The world's nothing but a can full of idiots The world's nothing but a basket full of stupids The world's nothing but a bucket full of morons I don't wanna talk to you so don't look at me (Hey boy, what you sayin'?) ------------ Corrections/references/notes: -Pretty sure the line in question with the Jerry Springer reference is "with their shit schtick." The censorship on this song is just reversed, but it almost sounds like "shit" is repeated immediately after the censored part. I reversed the audio to confirm that the censored portion is indeed "shit," so two words that sound almost identical, one being worthy of censorship and the other not...I feel like that's the only way the line makes sense. -"Kaczynski" refers to Ted Kaczynski, better known as the Unabomber, an anarchist recluse of a man who killed three people and injured 23 others in a series of bombings where he hid bombs in packages sent via mail. Him "having a good point" probably refers to Kaczynski's views on society expressed in his lengthy essay, "Industrial Society and Its Future," also known as the Unabomber Manifesto. -It's "hedonists" in verse two, not "heathenists." -"Or get murdered by Mr. Green in the alley with a lead pipe" is a reference to the 1985 film Clue.

It's basically just D-Am-C, with some momentary Dsus2, Asus2, and Cmaj7 chords from lifting off of the highest fretted note for a strum or two.

Yep, Junkyard Scientific was an early name SOB used, apparently sometimes in collaboration with Mike. Came up when Derek from LPA interviewed Mike. I feel like SOB/Xero/Relative Degree/Junkyard Scientific were all more or less one big group of frequent collaborators that did a lot of stuff under different names over the span of a couple years.

The "exhale the smoke from molotov cocktails" line in Fiends is sampled from Emcee 007's verse in Spies Like Us by Styles of Beyond, hence him also being credited on this song. Any further questions as to whether or not it's supposed to be "featuring 007?" lol. Also, been doing some digging on the Rapology series and trying to find out whether any other LP-related tracks were featured on them. So far, I've managed to track down tracklistings for volumes 2, 4, 8, 9, 15, and 16 - nothing featured on any of those, but of note, High and Mighty's "B-Boy Document '99" is featured on volume 16, which was sampled in She Couldn't. I'd be willing to bet that's where Mike and/or Joe first heard the song. *Edit* Found a tracklisting for volume 10 as well (nothing - it's titled as "Rapology X" instead of using the number 10, which made it harder to find), and I just bought a copy of volume 11 on Amazon that didn't include the tracklisting - fingers crossed!. Haven't found any info on volume 12, but I feel like if there are any further tracks to be found, they'll either be on 11 or 12. As previously said, anything earlier than 9 would be too early, and 16 is well into 1999 when Chester was in the band, so I doubt they would have been contributing any further songs at that point.

1. "Drop" is, for all intents and purposes, an untitled track. An overwhelming majority of tracks on these compilations are just titled "Drop." 2. "Fiends" is just titled "Fiends" and I'm really not sure why it's being debated. A little common sense makes it clearly obvious that "F/007" is supposed to be "featuring 007," and if you guys would actually bother to look at the rest of the tracklisting you'd see every other artist on these compilations has their record label credited after their song's title. "CO Rap Up" is "courtesy of Rap Up," which is presumably another early indie label name Xero was associated with like Mix Media. Remember, Rap Up gets a shoutout in one of the scratch samples in It's Goin Down. Sorry for sounding like a dick, I'm just a little confused why anyone would think "F/007 Fiends CO Rap Up" sounds like a song title lol.

With the exception of Final Masquerade, Linkin Park music videos from the past decade or so have more or less been things that I watch once, shrug, then forget about. This isn't going to be any exception.

I believe the 4 clips on the Crawling DVD were also part of Frat Party, but not 100% sure on that. I have the In the End DVD single, but not the Crawling one, so I can't check.

FYI the Youtube video of Beta State performing Change was made private ages ago, but it's available on their Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/betastate/videos/vb.55032792947/10153511246142948/

I'm sure the link will be deleted anyway, so kind of a moot point in me responding to this, but...tracklisting jumbled up from what's on the CD, multiple mono audio tracks combined into stereo tracks for some reason, and really bad non-descriptive track titles in spite of the work I did for LPCatalog to ensure all of their information was accurate (plus a bonus LMAO to the "instrumental" which is literally just all of the tracks combined with no regard for mix levels, which sounds like utter shit)...either this is a rip from a completely different source than what I was aware of existing, or somebody shit all over a lot of hard work by a couple well-meaning people. Sucks when this is what leaks out when the intent was to eventually figure out a legitimate way of sharing something that looked like this: (All messages regarding this will be ignored, FYI)

Yay, another Mike instrumental song that will never actually get released in an official/complete format...

I don't think the Runaway/By Myself multitracks actually leaked anywhere, LPCatalog just finally got around to ripping them and deciphering what's on them.

Unlike Heavy, both of these songs sound like there may actually be some decent songwriting going on in them (One More Light, in particular). How they end up sounding on the album remains to be seen... Also, this cycle's already proving to be a weird one - 4/10 songs from the album performed live already, over two months before the album's even out, but two of them have only been done in alternate arrangements, the lead single's only been performed in its original form once, and the other song that was performed "normally" had a massive gag order put on it.

Completely up to the owner of the original content in question how much they want to charge, or if they would even permit its use in the first place. And there's all kinds of other stipulations that could come up too...good example is how The Verve earns no money whatsoever from their biggest hit Bittersweet Symphony because the Rolling Stones' management sued them over the verse progression being lifted from an orchestral version of The Last Time, and absurdly demanded 100% of the royalties (the irony being that the Stones blatantly ripped off an existing song when they wrote The Last Time in the first place, but hey, they're the Rolling Stones, they don't have to follow the same rules everyone else does...). Paying it would probably fall on the band's shoulders.

Yeah, they'd probably still get in some kind of trouble if they released a song with an uncleared sample in it through any official medium that they actually acknowledged. However, if it were to "accidentally" leak somewhere, without them saying anything about it, in a way that couldn't necessarily be pinned on them... I figure it'll show up somewhere eventually.

THP's first two singles went to #1 on the U.S. Mainstream Rock chart. GATS in particular was on the radio regularly for MONTHS.

The With You/Runaway guitars are the same modified 6-string PRS's he's been using on those songs since the Living Things tour.

Yep...even more cringeworthy than Twenty One Pilots is to begin with.

LP Carpool Karaoke would be AMAZING.

Not gonna lie, the idea of Chester rapping sounds pretty cringeworthy to me.

I'm sure the fact that an entire STP tour was cancelled due to recording commitments with LP (a.k.a. Warner gave them a hard deadline for The Hunting Party and basically strong-armed Chester into cancelling other appearances, just like they did with the Grey Daze reunion show in 2002) also made him re-think how feasible it was to be in both bands without one getting in the way of the other. Not that I doubt family was his primary reason, but there's rarely ever just one thing factoring into something like this.

61 million views for an artist who has never even released a full-length album says otherwise. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO9cBXRcBvo There's also the fact that there's guitar from the second verse onwards in Heavy, and the live drums come in with the second chorus.

Xero demo - 1997 HTEP - May 1999 (likely) 2-track demo - Fall 1999 9-track demo - January 7th, 2000 7-track/8-track demo - February 2000 Web demos 1 - March 2000 6-track demo - April 25th, 2000 By Myself (Raw Power) - April/May 2000 Studio Finals (Inc. Now I See) - May 7th, 2000 Web demos 2 - May/June, 2000 Plaster - June 2nd, 2000 Final album mix - July 18th, 2000 Is what I'm getting from this. Throwing LPU demos into the mix, here's my best guess: Coal, Pods - Likely made entirely by Mike in 1997-1998 while in Xero. Stick and Move, Sad, Oh No, Grr, Chair - "Transitional period" demos, given their minimal instrumentation definitely took place in the post-Mark era and possibly even prior to Chester joining. Late 1998-Early 1999? Lumping these all together but may have come from a fairly varied period. Esaul, Blue, Slip, So Far Away - Likely March-May 1999, probably prior to HTEP Hurry - Has to be later than So Far Away due to the nature of its composition, likely an attempt to re-write the song by Mike. Mid-1999? ITE demo - Very similar to 9-track version. Late 1999/Early 2000. POA demo - Very similar to 9-track version. Late 1999/Early 2000. Forgotten demo - Identical to 9-track version (January 7th, 2000).

Lol. Blackout has real guitar in the outro. Wretches and Kings has some live drums mixed with the sampled stuff, there's a live guitar part in the outro, and the bass is a real bass run through a Z.Vex Mastotron fuzz pedal. ALL of the guitar parts in Waiting for the End are live. The Catalyst has live bass and guitar from the second verse onwards. In Between has live guitar from the first chorus onwards. Protip: Know what you're talking about. *Edit* I'd excuse ignorance if not for the fact that save for In Between, every song you listed has multitracks available that you could easily reference to correct yourself.