Linkin Park
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| Background information | ||
| Origin |  Agoura Hills, California, USA |
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| Genre(s) | Nu metal[1] Rapcore[2] Alternative metal[3] Alternative rock[4] |
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| Years active | 1996–present | |
| Label(s) | Warner Bros. Records Machine Shop Recordings |
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| Associated acts |
Fort Minor Snow White Tan Grey Daze Relative Degree |
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| Website | www.linkinpark.com | |
| Members | ||
| Chester Bennington Joe Hahn Mike Shinoda Brad Delson Rob Bourdon Dave "Phoenix" Farrell |
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| Former members | ||
| Scott Koziol (Stand-in) Kyle Christener (Stand-in) Mark Wakefield |
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Linkin Park are a multi-platinum rock band from Los Angeles, California. They achieved mainstream success in 2000 with their debut album, Hybrid Theory, which has since sold twenty-four million copies.[1] The band’s following studio album, Meteora also garnered success, topping the Billboard 200’s album charts in 2003.[2] The band’s latest album, Minutes to Midnight, is slated to be released internationally on May 14, 2007 and on May 15, 2007 in the United States.[3]
Contents |
[edit] Band history
[edit] Early years
Originally consisting of three close high school friends, Linkin Park’s foundation was anchored by Mike Shinoda, Brad Delson, and Rob Bourdon.[4] After graduating from high school, the Agoura Hills natives later began to take their musical interests more seriously, recruiting Joe Hahn, Dave "Phoenix" Farrell, and Mark Wakefield to perform in their band, then titled Xero. Though limited in resources, the band began recording and producing songs within Shinoda’s make-shift bedroom studio in 1996.[4] Tensions and frustration within the band began to increase after the band failed to land a record deal. The lack of success and stalemate in progress prompted Wakefield, at that time the band’s vocalist, to leave the band in search for other projects.[4] Later, Farrell would also leave the band in order to tour with Tasty Snax and other bands.[5][6]
After spending a considerable time searching for Wakefield’s surrogate, Xero, now known as Hybrid Theory, recruited Arizonian vocalist Chester Bennington. Jeff Blue, the vice president of Zomba Music, referred Bennington to the band in March of 1999.[7] Bennington, formerly of Grey Daze, became a standout among applicants for his unique and vivid singing style. The newborn chemistry between Shinoda and Bennington helped revive the band, inciting them to work on new material.[4] The band’s renaissance culminated with a change in name; from Hybrid Theory, the band changed their name to Linkin Park, a play and homage to Santa Monica’s Lincoln Park.[4] However, despite these changes, the band still struggled to sign a record deal. After facing numerous rejections from several major record labels, Linkin Park turned to Jeff Blue for additional help. After failing to catch Warner Bros. Records on three previous reviews, Jeff Blue, now the vice president of Warner Bros. Records, helped the band sign a deal with the company in 1999. Now aside with Warner Bros. Records, the band released their breakthrough album, Hybrid Theory, the following year.[7]
[edit] Breakthrough success
Linkin Park released Hybrid Theory on October 24, 2000. The album, which represented nearly half a decade’s worth of the band’s work, was edited and polished by music producer Don Gilmore.[4] Hybrid Theory was well received by music fans; The band sold more than 4.8 million records during its debut year, while singles such as Crawling and One Step Closer established themselves as staples among Alternative Rock radio playlists during the year.[5] Additionally, other singles from the album were featured in movies such as Dracula 2000, Little Nicky, and Valentine.[5] Hybrid Theory was also nominated for three Grammy Awards, including best new artist, best rock album, and best hard rock performance (for Crawling).[8] MTV also awarded the band their Best Rock Video and Best Direction awards for In the End.[4] Though the band only won the Grammy for best hard rock performance, Hybrid Theory’s overall success had catapulted the band into the mainstream's attention.
During this time, Linkin Park received many invitations to perform with many recognized tours and concerts including Ozzfest, Family Values Tour and KROQ Almost Acoustic Christmas.[5][9] The band also formed their own tour, Projekt Revolution, which featured other notable artists such as, Cypress Hill, Adema, and Snoop Dogg.[7] Within a year’s stretch, Linkin Park had performed at over 320 concerts.[4] The experiences and performances of the precocious band were documented in their first DVD, Frat Party at the Pankake Festival, which debuted in November of 2001. Now reunited with former bassist Dave Farrell, the band began work on a remix album, dubbed Reanimation, which would include works from Hybrid Theory and Hybrid Theory EP.[5] The album debuted on July 30, 2002, featuring the likes of Black Thought, Jonathan Davis, Aaron Lewis, and many others.[10] Reanimation claimed the second spot on the Billboard 200, and sold nearly 860,000 copies during its debut week.[11]
[edit] Meteora, Live In Texas, Collision Course
Despite constantly writing on the tour-bus etc. The band only headed back to the studio in mid-2002 to record their follow-up to Hybrid Theory. The name of the album was kept a secret until December, where it was revealed to be named after Meteora, a series of monasteries high atop rock formations in Greece, which they learned about from looking at pictures in a travel magazine. "It's this really spiritual, mythical place," Delson said, "Just looking at those pictures was inspirational to us in terms of how epic it felt. I think some of the guys hadn't even seen the pictures when they heard the name Meteora, and they just really responded to the energy of the name. We think that suitably matches the spirit we tried to create with the record."[12] The album’s first single, “Somewhere I Belong”, was released in February of 2003 to critical acclaim. On March 25, 2003, Meteora was released and debuted at number one on Billboard’s music chart after selling 810,000 copies in its first week. It has sold nearly 11 million copies worldwide, more than half of that in the US alone.
Following the release of the album, the band embarked on its second Projekt Revolution tour with Blindside, Mudvayne and Xzibit. “Faint” was released as a single toward the end of the tour. Following the second Projekt Revolution, the band joined Metallica on their Summer Sanitarium Tour 2003 with Limp Bizkit, Deftones and, once again, Mudvayne. The band also headlined on Friday of the 2003 Reading Festival in the UK with co-headliner Blink-182, playing a highly energetic set to some 65.000 fans (other headliners included Metallica, System of a Down, Blur and AFI.) Shortly after the Sanitarium tour came to a close, the band released "Numb" as a single. They shot a video for the single in Prague, Czech Republic while simultaneously shooting a video for the song “From the Inside”. Bennington became ill before the video for “Numb” could be completed, so the remainder was filmed in a church in Los Angeles.
On November 18, 2003, Linkin Park released a brand-new DVD/CD live set entitled Live in Texas. The footage was shot while on the Summer Sanitarium tour in Dallas and Houston, Texas. The DVD combined two live shows together; the video and audio from both shows were edited together. Because of this, the band had to wear the same clothing for both shows on consecutive days. The DVD featured seventeen songs and the CD featured a selection of twelve of those.
In November, the third edition of the LPU launched. The package’s CD contained the five tracks that were cut from the Live in Texas DVD for its CD. This did not sit well with many fan club members, who claimed that the band should have placed rare songs on the CD (as with year two) instead of the live tracks. At the end of 2003, the band performed at its third KROQ Almost Acoustic Christmas concert. They headlined night one and played a seventeen-song set. At the end of Linkin Park’s set, they played “One Step Closer” and were joined on stage by P.O.D.’s frontman, Sonny Sandoval. At the beginning of 2004, the band set off on its “Meteora World Tour” with P.O.D., Hoobastank and Story of the Year. The band claimed that this was the final leg of the world-wide tour that the band had been on since Meteora was released.
During the tour, the band’s video for “From the Inside” was released internationally. Following the "Meteora World Tour", the band began work on their most ambitious music video to date. The video, which was to be based around the song “Breaking the Habit”, featured Japanese-style animation by the same studio that created the animated scenes in Kill Bill, Production I.G., and was directed by Kazuto Nakazawa and Hahn. The video featured Bennington’s soul travelling through an old apartment building visiting various people struggling with various habits that they were trying to break. Prior to the release of “Breaking the Habit” as a single, “Lying From You” was released to radios to serve as a radio-only single.
Linkin Park then set off on its third Projekt Revolution tour. It would prove to be the band’s most ambitious tour as it included two stages and what the band called the Revolution Village. The tour was very similar to the Ozzfest and the Vans Warped Tour. The main stage featured Linkin Park, Korn, Snoop Dogg, the Used and Less Than Jake while the second stage featured Ghostface, Funeral for a Friend, M.O.P., downset., No Warning, instruction and Autopilot Off. DJ Z-Trip also travelled with the tour, serving as the between-sets entertainment. During the hip-hop sets, Ivan the Urban Action Figure danced on stage. The Revolution Village featured lots of entertainment, including video game kiosks, miniature skate Parks, batting cages, remixing stages and more. Projekt Revolution 2004 was the biggest-selling tour of the year.
At the end of 2004, Linkin Park announced a collaboration with Jay-Z at the request of MTV. The resulting EP, Collision Course, was released on November 30. It featured mashups of seven Linkin Park songs and six Jay-Z songs. The EP’s first single, “Numb/Encore”, peaked at number twenty on the billboard charts and remained in the charts for six months, going on to win a Grammy. The album itself debuted at number one on the charts.
The fourth edition of the LPU launched in November. The CD that shipped with the package featured two new songs; one was a roughly two-minute long instrumental piece called “Sold My Soul to Yo Mama” by Mr. Hahn, and the other a song called “Standing in the Middle”, a collaboration with Motion Man. “Standing in the Middle” was originally recorded in 2001 as a “practice” song for Reanimation. Motion Man was eventually featured on Kutmasta Kurt’s reinterpretation of “In the End”.
[edit] Music for Relief, Fort Minor, Snow White Tan
The year 2005 marked a rather quiet year for Linkin Park. The band established Music for Relief, an organization dedicated to helping those affected by the 2004 Indian tsunami. The band played two shows in 2005, one in California for Music for Relief, and one during the Live 8 series of concerts at the Philadelphia, PA venue. In May, the band demanded to be released from its contract with Warner Bros. on the grounds of “a lack of confidence”. The band was recently in negotiations with the label over a new record contract. Linkin Park had four albums left outstanding on its 2000 record contract. In December 2005 the band announced that they had finally reached a settlement with Warner Bros. Records.
In July, Shinoda announced a hip-hop side project, Fort Minor. Shinoda explained the project as a way for him to return to his hip-hop roots.
Shortly after Shinoda's announcement of Fort Minor, Bennington was also revealed to be working on a solo project of his own. The project features Amir Derakh and Ryan Shuck of Orgy both playing guitar (as well as producing). Little is known about Bennington’s side project other than its name, Snow White Tan. Chester delayed the album due to work on their new album.
Linkin Park’s fifth installment of the LPU fan club launched on November 21, 2005. The CD shipped with the fifth fan club package featured live tracks from the band's performance during Live 8 plus several songs with Jay-Z.
[edit] 2006: In the Studio
In December of 2005, Mike Shinoda (who also produced Hybrid Theory EP, Reanimation and Collision Course) was confirmed as the co-producer for the next Linkin Park album. On February 8, 2006, the band announced the producer for their third studio album would be Rick Rubin, who has worked with such bands as The Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers, System of a Down and many others.
During the Grammy Award Ceremony 2006 Linkin Park joined with Jay-Z and Paul McCartney, where they performed the song “Numb/Encore/Yesterday”. The band went on to win a Grammy award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration.
Linkin Park performed live in August 2006 at Summer Sonic, hosted by Metallica in Japan. A new song, tentatively codenamed "QWERTY" and also referred in various websites as Behind Your Lies, leaked on numerous websites after being played at the concert. “QWERTY” (live and studio version), Reading My Eyes (live) and other exclusive live and studio tracks were released on Linkin Park Underground V6.0 Limited Edition Fan Club CD.
On August 29, 2006, the entire catalog of Linkin Park, including their collaborative work, was added to the iTunes music store. Linkin Park had been one of the few remaining major-label bands not selling digital versions of their music.
Linkin Park spent the majority of 2006 writing and recording their third album, and in various interview described the musical direction of the album. Lead singer Bennington stated, "we're straying away from a lot of the predictable sounds we've had in the past, but there's no question in your mind when you hear it that it's Linkin Park...We've always said we write the music we write so that we can spread our wings as far as we want and try new things and go anywhere. I think we're really going to prove that with this new record."[13] Regarding album co-producer Rick Rubin, Mike Shinoda stated, “Rick is one of those guys where you can go through any door you want to go through. We’re trying everything, just messing around with it until it sounds good”.[14]
[edit] Minutes to Midnight
On March 6, 2007, Warner Brothers announced that Linkin Park’s third release, titled Minutes to Midnight, would be released Monday May 14th in all countries except the United States, which would receive the album on Tuesday May 15th. The first single was released April 2nd, and is titled “What I've Done”.
“We have put more into the new album than anything we have ever done before”, says bassist Dave “Phoenix“ Farrell. The band spent over 14 months in the studio and wrote more than 101 song demos in the making of Minutes to Midnight, an album which vocalist Mike Shinoda sees as, “a breakthrough in the development of the band's sound”.[15]
"This was a year-and-a-half long process of really hard work and experimentation in the studio that yielded about 150 rough songs," guitarist Brad Delson told Billboard.com. The band recorded 17 tracks and is now whittling down which ones will make the final cut. “Not only is this album incredibly diverse, but the depth of the material is really strong”, Delson says.[16]
The title is a reference to the Doomsday Clock,[17] and lead singer Chester Bennington said that the band is writing about "things they wouldn't have touched a few years back."
Mike Shinoda explained that Minutes to Midnight is composed of sounds made by a practically Arcade Fire-esque array of instruments including banjos, marimbas and vintage guitars and amps. “People have always tried to lump us in with the whole rap/rock stereotype, but we don’t intentionally want to be part of that scene. We’ve always had our own personality and I think it really shows on this record.”
While there are no special artists featured on the album, Shinoda shares a co-producing credit with the Grammy award-winning producer Rick Rubin, “I was raised on his music and to now be working with him, to be mentored by him, is such a huge thing.”
It has also been said that Linkin Park have experimented with various instruments, including Vintage Drums.
Linkin Park recently performed six songs for AOL Sessions, which will be released a couple of weeks before the new album hits stores. The live set will consist of three new songs, as well as three older songs.
The video for “What I've Done” premiered on MTV and Fuse, the week of April 2nd.[18]
[edit] Trivia
- Members of Linkin Park have done a number of collaborations for other bands and artists, including Mötley Crüe, DJ Lethal, Young Buck, Handsome Boy Modeling School and the X-Ecutioners.
- Joe and Chester make a minor cameo Adema’s video for The Way You Like It.[citation needed]
- Linkin Park's first two studio albums, Hybrid Theory and Meteora, did not include any explicit lyrics.
- The band's members have been featured on numerous MTV shows, including MTV Cribs and Punk'd.
- Conservative talk radio host Mark Levin uses "Somewhere I belong" as the intro and bumper music for his show.
- The band uses numerous references of popular animes, such as Gundam, in their album art, music videos, and lyrics.
- The Hybrid Theory album cover art is different in Japan than on other countries' cover art due to ethical concerns.
[edit] Band members
[edit] Current
- Chester Bennington – Vocals (1998–present)
- Rob Bourdon – Drums (1996–present)
- Brad Delson – Lead Guitar (1996–present)
- Dave "Phoenix" Farrell – Bass Guitar (1996–1999, 2001–present)
- Joe Hahn – Turntables, Samples, Beats (1996–present)
- Mike Shinoda – Vocals, Guitar, Keyboards/Piano (1996–present)
[edit] Former
- Mark Wakefield – Lead Vocals (1996–1998) Singer/Screamer of the band. Left in 1998 to manage the band Taproot. Later replaced by Chester Bennington.
[edit] Stand-ins
- Kyle Christener— Bass Guitar (1998–1999) Stand in bass player during Phoenix's absence from the band during the Hybrid Theory EP.
- Scott Koziol— Bass Guitar (1999–2001) Stand in bass player in the Hybrid Theory album. Records on the song One Step Closer and appears in the video.
[edit] Discography
[edit] Albums and EPs
| Year | Album | US | UK | Label | U.S. Sales |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1997 | Xero Sampler Tape | - | - | Independent Release | |
| 1999 | Hybrid Theory EP | - | - | Mix Media | |
| 2000 | Hybrid Theory | 2 | 3 | Warner Bros. Records | 10x Platinum (Diamond) |
| 2002 | Reanimation | 2 | 3 | Warner Bros. Records/Machine Shop Recordings | Platinum |
| 2003 | Meteora | 1 | 1 | Warner Bros. Records/Machine Shop Recordings | 6x Platinum |
| Live in Texas | 23 | 43 | Warner Bros. Records/Machine Shop Recordings | Gold | |
| 2004 | Collision Course | 1 | 15 | Warner Bros. Records/Machine Shop Recordings/Roc-a-Fella Records | Platinum |
| 2007 | Minutes to Midnight | - | - | Warner Bros. Records/Machine Shop Recordings |
[edit] Videography
[edit] Music Videos
Linkin Park has developed an extensive music video catalog. Band member Joe Hahn has directed a number of them.
The majority of Linkin Park’s music videos are extremely cinematic, taking advantage of computer animation, cinematography, and special effects. Some of the videos involve plot lines portrayed by hired actors in addition to vignettes of the band's performance. The music video for "Breaking the Habit", well-recognized for its use of anime, won the Viewer's Choice Award at the 2005 MTV Video Music Awards.
[edit] DVD/VHS
- Frat Party at the Pankake Festival (2002)
- The Making of Meteora (Limited Release) (2003)
- Live in Texas (2003)
- Breaking The Habit (2004)
- Collision Course (2004)
- Live 8 (2005)
[edit] See also
- List of best-selling albums worldwide
- List of best selling remix album worldwide
- Machine Shop Recordings
- Linkin Park Underground
- Fort Minor
- Snow White Tan
- Jay-Z
- Projekt Revolution
[edit] References
- ^ Riaa.com, Double Diamonds Jump Start 2005, Retrieved on March 19, 2007
- ^ Soundspike.com, Album Chart: Linkin Park’s ‘Meteora’ shoots to the top, Retrieved on March 19, 2007
- ^ Blabbermouth.net, New Audio Interview With MIKE SHINODA Available Retrieved on April 8, 2007
- ^ a b c d e f g h AskMen.com, Linkin Park – Biography Retrieved on March 20, 2007
- ^ a b c d e Rockdetector.com, Linkin Park – Rockdetector Biography Retrieved on March 20, 2007
- ^ Livedaily.com, LiveDaily Interview: Linkin Park’s Dave 'Phoenix' Farrell Retrieved on March 20, 2007
- ^ a b c Lptimes.com, Band History Retrieved on March 20, 2007
- ^ United Stations Radio Network, Linkin Park's Grammy Noms Are Icing On The Cake Retrieved on March 26, 2007
- ^ MTV.com, Linkin Park, P.O.D., Nickelback, More To Play LA’s KROQ Fest Retrieved on March 26, 2007
- ^ United Stations Radio Network, Linkin Park’s 'Reanimation' Set For July 30 Retrieved on March 26, 2007
- ^ Yahoo! Music, Linkin Park Remixes Chart With Number Two Debut Retrieved on March 26, 2007
- ^ Wiederhorn, Jon (January 28, 2003). Linkin Park Get Their Tempers Under Control To Complete New LP. Retrieved on June 10, 2006.
- ^ Nu Metal sound gone in Linkin Park's new album
- ^ Linkin Park Go Eclectic For New Album
- ^ Warner Brothers Records (2007-03-06). Fans Counting the 'Minutes' as Linkin Park Reveal Album Name and Release Date. Press release.
- ^ Clock Strikes 'Midnight' For New Linkin Park Album. billboard.com (2007-03-06).
- ^ Linkin Park Finish Apocalyptic Album, Revive Projekt Revolution Tour. MTV (2007-03-06).
- ^ Videostatic
[edit] External links
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