Astat

Yep. It's not necessarily that they CAN'T play it, I just question whether or not they'd put in the time to learn it, particularly with the aforementioned tuning discrepancy. They could play it up half a step in C#, I suppose...tuning a song UP rarely sounds good, though.

With a few exceptions, I see this album being really difficult to do live. Final Masquerade will probably translate well. I can see The Summoning/War being used as an opener on Carnivores, Brad will probably B.S. his way through the solo like he does on GATS but other than that it'll probably work pretty well live. Keys to the Kingdom will probably suck live. It jumps around a ton, the vocals will be incredibly tough on Chester, and the way it opens up with practically unaccompanied screaming, I can see it being a song that the band fucks up the intro of all the time. All For Nothing would be a little easier from a musical standpoint, but Mike doing Page's vocals will probably be pretty iffy. Rebellion will flat-out not be performed live without Daron, I almost guarantee it. The guitar tuning Daron uses is not one that LP uses. Brad and Phoenix would also have to learn guitar/bass parts that they didn't have any part in recording, and fairly difficult ones at that. It's a shame, because other than the instrumentation being a deal-breaker, this song would probably translate pretty well live. Drawbar has no reason to be played live, other than the piano at the very end potentially being used as a Final Masquerade intro. Mark the Graves and A Line in the Sand are extremely progressive tracks with weird timing and dynamic changes and a million things that could go wrong. They might TRY to play one or both of them live, but I don't see either one working out well. So yeah, I predict Final Masquerade and War (potentially with The Summoning) being added for Carnivores, but not much else.

The Project Spark video WAS the GATS music video. That's all we're getting for that song.

I think the mindset that Rick got the band into by working with them for a few albums is still something they believe in (don't be predictable, don't make music to satisfy anyone but yourselves, etc.). They were probably just at the point where they couldn't justify paying Rick a shitload of money to produce another album when they knew exactly what he'd bring to the table and they'd likely be on the same page anyway.

I saw someone mention that they think the first half of the album is the strongest - I disagree. From Rebellion onwards this record is damn near flawless. I feel like KTTK/AFR are a kind of odd pairing to open the album with, KTTK in particular has to be the weirdest opening song they've ever done. It's like a rock version of Until It Breaks. I'm not saying I DISLIKE those songs, but I think the sequencing is a little weird on the front half of the record. The Summoning/War seems like the more "natural" opening pair to me. I probably would have put it together like this: 01. The Summoning 02. War 03. Keys to the Kingdom 04. All for Nothing 05. Guilty All the Same 06. Wastelands 07. Until It's Gone 08. Rebellion 09. Mark the Graves 10. Drawbar 11. Final Masquerade 12. A Line in the Sand But yeah, tracks 8 through 12 just blew me away. Loved The Summoning/War as well, and I have a new appreciation for GATS hearing it in sequence (the studio banter between Mike and Brad leading into it is just PRICELESS). Least favorite track is Until It's Gone, with Wastelands second from the bottom.

People who can't make out Tom Morello's playing on Drawbar obviously aren't familiar with some of Tom Morello's guitar tones. That thing accompanying the piano isn't a synth, people. It was established quite a while ago that most of the songs on this record were connected by short interludes. No different than what they've been doing since Meteora with making songs flow together (Don't Stay > Somewhere I Belong, Breaking the Habit > From the Inside, Shadow of the Day > What I've Done, etc.). I'll be reviewing this, might not get it done tonight though.

Why do people act like festival shows "don't count" for some reason? I'll GLADLY go see LP play a full-length headlining set (translation: the SAME FUCKING SET THEY'D BE PLAYING IF IT WAS AN AREA TOUR) in front of 80,000 people any day. On a similar note, why do people act like U.S. amphitheater tours "don't count" unless they have the Projekt Revolution name attached to them? Because obviously the name of the tour makes ALL the difference, right?

Literally the first time I've seen a microphone in front of him all tour. Actually, looking at the setlist, that's the only song in there that he would sing backups on anyway, so I guess it's not too big of a deal. I just definitely remember not seeing him do that the first few shows. Yeah, Brad hasn't been doing the keyboard parts since he hurt his back. I think it's because he doesn't want to climb the stairs up to where Mike's keyboard is (he's been staying on the lowest level of the stage at all times the last few shows). I noticed that Rob's ride cymbal looks a little smaller than what I remember, I know he had a 21" ride at one point but it looks like he may have gone down to the more "standard" 20" one. Some more guitar stuff: -Brad's playing guitar on Blackout now, which is funny because there isn't actually guitar in it (he used to play keys/drums on it)! He just strums an E octave at an eighth note rhythm during the last part of the song. -During the encore, Brad's playing a PRS on several songs that he typically would play a Strat on: Until It's Gone, A Light That Never Comes, and Lost in the Echo. He played these songs on a Strat for the first couple shows of the tour, but switched at one of the Russia shows. I'm guessing it's related to the issues he was having with the EBow on the No More Sorrow intro to UIG - an EBow works a lot easier on a guitar with humbucking pickups. Still, that doesn't explain why he wouldn't switch to the Strat after UIG, he has plenty of time to...might be another back injury-related thing, he may want to minimize his guitar changes.

*Edit* Nevermind, not worth potentially going to jail for what I WANT to say to you. But let's just put it this way, I've never attacked someone's personal life just because I was butthurt that they called me out on something stupid I said. You, on the other hand...well, the post is quoted now. And you're apparently in the minority because a LOT of people have pointed out how much I've toned it down over the last couple years. I used to go on tirades almost every day. Maybe that's just because the LP fanbase is older on average now and there aren't as many idiots around though.

Someone with 2 million Twitter followers is "looking for attention" by retweeting an account with 30,000 followers. Yeah, okay.

Ahh, so they're re-airing other performances in between bands. I see.

Are you guys sure about the stream times? Kaiser Chiefs aren't even on yet and LP's supposed to be starting in an hour according to what's posted here.

Aaaaand the whole "Auto Tune pulling Chester's voice to the wrong notes" issue in GATS is back, after it was fixed for the Russia shows. That's a head-scratcher...

2 album cycles in a row? Really? Dick move.

ATS Arena tour had a playlist of a bunch of songs pre-show. A lot of them were songs that were also in rotation on LP's iHeartRadio station at the time. I don't remember what the last one before the show every night was though. Song after the show ended was the Bluegrass Tribute to Linkin Park version of One Step Closer, which was also used as the post-show music on the Dead By Sunrise tour. The only other pre-show music I can recall for sure is Something I Can Never Have by Nine Inch Nails, which was used throughout 2004.

LP's contract with Warner Bros. was redone in 2006, that's a big part of why Minutes to Midnight took so long. It hasn't been re-structured again since then. It wouldn't have any influence on why the webcasts mostly stopped in 2007 and seem to be returning this year.

Great, so all that hype about Recharge being an LP Facebook game that you didn't have to have a stupid smartphone/tablet to play is out the window now. Should've seen this coming when they went months without updating the game, but it's bullshit that all the time/potentially money Facebook players invested in the game was all for nothing. Probably just LP sucking up to Apple because they're pissed about them using Microsoft-powered gear on stage lately.

Pretty sure it's just one performance.

Could easily just be a one-off show with no STP touring plans. Doesn't necessarily impact LP.

Knew about that the day after the Tucson show. It's on the Tucson show page.

http://www.guitarworld.com/interview-linkin-park-guitarist-brad-delson-talks-new-album-hunting-party#slide-3 Interview with Brad about the new album, goes over a lot of stuff that we've heard before, but at the very end, there's an interesting quote regarding the band's touring plans: Does this mean the band will be doing a second U.S. tour shortly after Carnivores? Perhaps a fall/winter arena tour?

Guitar and bass on Rebellion were both done by Daron.

Brad's in time with Rob just fine on GATS. It's Chester who loses the rhythm.

Like most 20-something Americans at 3 in the afternoon on a Tuesday, I was at work. Sound-wise, this song sounds about like what I expected it to. LP vocals over a SOAD-ish instrumental. Not a bad thing, just the predictable outcome of having Daron involved. Rob once again drums his ass off on this one. Very well-produced song for as heavy as the instrumental is, but not in an overproduced, "Avenged Sevenfold-esque" manner (I'll probably get some crap for saying that, but c'mon, A7X has more polished production than half of the pop artists out there these days...). Vocals are solid all around. What REALLY pushes this song over the edge and makes it my favorite of the four released so far though, is the lyrics. These are by FAR the best lyrics on the songs we've heard. Nice to hear a meaningful social commentary-type song from the band that isn't over a soft Hands Held High kind of instrumental for a change.

Given past history with this festival, I'll believe LP is being streamed when I see it.