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Description
Linkin park – Hybrid theory

Back in the year 2000, the music scene was different. Disposable dance music flooded and ruled the charts, Pop idol and The “X” factor were unheard of, and Rock, Urban and Metal music was taking a back seat. The Nu-metal movement that started in the mid nineties, first in the states with bands like Limp bizkit, Korn and the Deftones was slowly receding into it’s own embarrassed and dated dark corner. This is the year that Rock and Rap music needed a kick in the backside to get them going up to the top of the chats again, like the heady days of the 80’s and early 90’s. This is also the year that Linkin park released Hybrid theory, their clean-cut, short and not so sweet debut, that blended Nu-metal guitars and screaming vocals with urban rap attack verses and funky, nearly old skool drum loops, and of course, the occasional disc-scratch.
Hybrid theory was the first real rap-metal album, and spawned a tidal wave of pretenders. This simple, emotional slice of modern urban paranoid poetry struck a chord with the disillusioned teenage youth, sick of soulless music about sex and having a good time, and shot up the charts, propelling Linkin park to worldwide fame almost instantly with their first single One step closer, a song laced with a harmonic and recognisable guitar riff, with a middle section of DJ scratches and dirty beat feedback, about arguing and never getting your own way with someone. This signalled the start of something big.
As soon as Linkin park released Hybrid theory many occasional music fans and snobby indie critics hated the record and the band, attacking the album with comments about the fact that it was too produced, unoriginal and filled with sophomoric angst. And, after my 16th birthday, I am afraid to say that I was one of them. By that time Linkin park had become something that I had to hate to be accepted within my peers and to be taken seriously in a musical sense. I held this point of view right up until recently. I was walking along on a cold, clear night, when I looked to the moon. I thought to myself that no one has ever described how the moon only shines because of the sun’s light reflecting off of it, and used it as a metaphor. I was going to use this as a base for a song of my own, when these words popped into my head:

I watch how the moon sits in the sky on a dark night,
shining with the light from the sun,
but the sun doesn’t give the light to the moon assuming,
the moon’s gonna owe it one.

It makes me think of how you act to me,
You do favours then rapidly,
Just turn around and start asking about,
Things that you want back from me.

These of course, being the words to the first verse of  A place for my head by Linkin park.

This is the first time since I was about 14 that I had thought of these words and for the first time ever I realised what they were going on about. Because, when you are in your early teens, all you listen to is the hooks, and not the rest.
I promptly downloaded the whole of Hybrid theory (I’ll buy it soon, I promise) and remembered why I wasted my early teens listening to this band.
Right from the clean beats and urban paranoid/schizophrenic tinted opening anti-anthem Papercuts – a song about having voices in your head – straight past the epic and wounded in the end and right up to pushes me away – the album’s climax – the listener is assaulted with Mike Shinoda’s rap verses about urban decay and dissatisfaction, and Chester Bennigton’s primal scream therapy choruses that are laden with hooks and simple, emotive, short lines. The drums pound their way through the choruses, and groove their way through the verses. The guitar is clean, with simple and memorable riffs, then all of a sudden cranking up the distortion and power chords, and then ceasing just as suddenly to make way for the mid section of DJ scratches and electronic blips from Joseph Hahn. Altogether the sound created on Hybrid theory is that of short, punchy songs with subjects usually about feeling downtrodden, paranoid or just being fed up with life.
Most of you that will read this will have listened to this band and abandoned them because you have “grown out” of them. You will probably have taken a sarcastic and superior stance against this style of music. Remember – it may sound dated now, but 5 years ago, this was groundbreaking. And once you realise that, and get past trying to analyse every lyric as a clichéd, unneeded emotional potboiler, that is there for the sake of appealing to the masses of angsty teens, you realise that there is a very mature element of feeling scared, forgotten and left behind in a world that can sometimes be very big, very scary, and very, very unfair.

I will now review the three tracks that I feel are the most important on the album in more depth.

Papercuts

Starting with a very clean and simple drum loop, and quickly moving into action within the first few seconds, Papercuts is an obvious choice for the album opener, giving us a peek towards what to expect, and showing exactly why Linkin park should not be underrated. The song is like a first chapter in a book, a character reference of the album contained in three minutes. This song is what the band is trying to say in the whole of Hybrid theory Mike Shinoda begins with his vocal stabs –

Why, why, night and day, some of these things I write today,
Why am I so uptight today?
Paranoia’s all I got left.

I know just what it feels like to have a voice in the back of my head.

Everybody has face inside, a face that awakes when I close my eyes, that watches every time I lie, laughs everytime I fall.

You’ve got a face on the inside too, you’re paranoia’s probably worse.

Everybody acts like the fact of the matter is that I can’t add up to what you can

This voice is the representation of all of our bad feelings about ourselves, whenever we do anything bad or immoral, the voice is there watching, waiting. Chester Bennigton’s chorus sums up the verses and meaning of the song –

It’s like I’m paranoid, looking over my back,
It’s like a whirlwind inside of my head,
It’s like I can’t stop what I’m hearing within,
It’s like a face inside, it’s right beneath my skin.

Linkin park have arrived.

In the end

This is a lot different to the main theme of the album, a lot more sombre. The song starts with a simple minor piano riff, with another mike Shinoda rap verse –

One thing, I don’t know why, it doesn’t even matter how hard you try,
keep that in mind, I designed this rhyme to explain in due time,
all I know, time is a valuable thing, watch it fly by as the pendulum swings,
watch it count down to the end of the day, the clock ticks life away,
it’s so unreal.

Things aren’t the way they were before. You wouldn’t even recognise me anymore

This song is about losing people, and not realising what’s happening until it’s too late. It’s probably Linkin park’s most lyrically strong song. The lyrics accompany the music and leave the listener with a sense of deep sadness and loss on the part of the lyricist. Chester Bennigton’s sung chorus once again sums up the song’s main theme, with guitars fully distorted:

I tried so hard, and got so far, but in the end, it doesn’t even matter.
I had to fall to lose it all, but in the end it doesn’t even matter.

The song is the most epic on the album, and shows a more tender side to the out and out anger displayed on songs such as one step closer, a place for my head and by myself

Forgotten

This is probably one of the best lyrical examples of Linkin park. The lyrics are written about life at night in an inner city, containing many double meanings and metaphors, running against the overall lyrical theme of being straight to the point. The song explodes into action from the first moments, all guns blazing, with a lyrical battle between mike Shinoda and Chester Bennigton forming the pre chorus –

CB: from the top to the bottom –
MS:  - bottom to top I stop,
CB: at the core I’ve forgotten –
MS: in the middle of my thoughts,
CB: taken far from my safety –
MS: the picture’s there,
CB: the memory won’t escape me –
MS: but why should I care?

Mike Shinoda then brings us another volley of rap verse:

There’s a place so dark, you can’t see the end,
skies cock back,
a shock that which can’t defend.

Then with the eyes shut,
looking through the rust and rotten dust,
a small spot of light floods the floor,
and pours over the rusted world of pretend,
and the eyes ease open, and it’s dark again.

Those last five lines are about hope. Hope that the world that they live in isn’t as bad as it seems, but in reality, it is often worse.

The band then launch into the lyrical battle pre-chorus, this time with the chorus from Chester Bennington after:

And the memory about me, eyes burning up,
the darkness holding me tightly, until the sun rises up

Next is a verse of Mike Shinoda rapping once more, these are my favourite Linkin park lyrics:

Moving all round, screaming of the ups and downs:
pollution manifested in perpetual sound.
The wheels go round, and the sunset creeps behind streetlamps,
Chainlink and concrete.
A little piece of paper with the picture drawn,
Flows on down the street until the wind is gone,
And the memory now is like the picture was then,
When the paper’s crumpled up, it can’t be perfect again.

Angsty? Immature? Too direct? I don’t think so. This song is proof against all the stereotypes and false accusations associated with this band. This song is lyrically excellent, and musically proficient, and no one has ever written as song like this before.

The song ends with a double chorus, and a shade of hope.

Other songs that deserve attention:

A place for my head – a song about being unappreciated by a loved one for good deeds done for them. The first verse is a very good example of the level of lyrical skill that Mike Shinoda is capable of.

Cure for the itch – the most detached song on the album. A short show-off tune, entirely composed by the band’s DJ Joseph Hahn. A humorous intro of vocal samples and the band messing about along with disc scratches and dirty beats is segued into a beautiful, simple synth horn section with a simple piano melody and broken, trippy beats. Gives one the impression of driving through a city at night.

Points of authority – a song about being abused by a self-righteous lover, who draws people in, and then uses them, before leaving them, and about how they will get their come-uppance one day.

The whole album is a clean cut, original journey through new century urban manic depression, with a tint of hope in songs like with you and pushes me away and total hopelessness in others such as in the end, crawling and Papercuts.

It is my firm conviction that there is not a weak or unnecessary song on this album. The whole album gets a solid 9.6 from me, and these songs:

Cure for the itch
A place for my head
Forgotten

Get a perfect 10.0 from me.

This album is essential, even if you don’t enjoy the music, as it album the started a whole new style of music and is truly original, which, in these dark ages of popular music, is something that is getting increasingly hard to come by.

Description
Linkin park – Hybrid theory

Back in the year 2000, the music scene was different. Disposable dance music flooded and ruled the charts, Pop idol and The “X” factor were unheard of, and Rock, Urban and Metal music was taking a back seat. The Nu-metal movement that started in the mid nineties, first in the states with bands like Limp bizkit, Korn and the Deftones was slowly receding into it’s own embarrassed and dated dark corner. This is the year that Rock and Rap music needed a kick in the backside to get them going up to the top of the chats again, like the heady days of the 80’s and early 90’s. This is also the year that Linkin park released Hybrid theory, their clean-cut, short and not so sweet debut, that blended Nu-metal guitars and screaming vocals with urban rap attack verses and funky, nearly old skool drum loops, and of course, the occasional disc-scratch.
Hybrid theory was the first real rap-metal album, and spawned a tidal wave of pretenders. This simple, emotional slice of modern urban paranoid poetry struck a chord with the disillusioned teenage youth, sick of soulless music about sex and having a good time, and shot up the charts, propelling Linkin park to worldwide fame almost instantly with their first single One step closer, a song laced with a harmonic and recognisable guitar riff, with a middle section of DJ scratches and dirty beat feedback, about arguing and never getting your own way with someone. This signalled the start of something big.
As soon as Linkin park released Hybrid theory many occasional music fans and snobby indie critics hated the record and the band, attacking the album with comments about the fact that it was too produced, unoriginal and filled with sophomoric angst. And, after my 16th birthday, I am afraid to say that I was one of them. By that time Linkin park had become something that I had to hate to be accepted within my peers and to be taken seriously in a musical sense. I held this point of view right up until recently. I was walking along on a cold, clear night, when I looked to the moon. I thought to myself that no one has ever described how the moon only shines because of the sun’s light reflecting off of it, and used it as a metaphor. I was going to use this as a base for a song of my own, when these words popped into my head:

I watch how the moon sits in the sky on a dark night,
shining with the light from the sun,
but the sun doesn’t give the light to the moon assuming,
the moon’s gonna owe it one.

It makes me think of how you act to me,
You do favours then rapidly,
Just turn around and start asking about,
Things that you want back from me.

These of course, being the words to the first verse of  A place for my head by Linkin park.

This is the first time since I was about 14 that I had thought of these words and for the first time ever I realised what they were going on about. Because, when you are in your early teens, all you listen to is the hooks, and not the rest.
I promptly downloaded the whole of Hybrid theory (I’ll buy it soon, I promise) and remembered why I wasted my early teens listening to this band.
Right from the clean beats and urban paranoid/schizophrenic tinted opening anti-anthem Papercuts – a song about having voices in your head – straight past the epic and wounded in the end and right up to pushes me away – the album’s climax – the listener is assaulted with Mike Shinoda’s rap verses about urban decay and dissatisfaction, and Chester Bennigton’s primal scream therapy choruses that are laden with hooks and simple, emotive, short lines. The drums pound their way through the choruses, and groove their way through the verses. The guitar is clean, with simple and memorable riffs, then all of a sudden cranking up the distortion and power chords, and then ceasing just as suddenly to make way for the mid section of DJ scratches and electronic blips from Joseph Hahn. Altogether the sound created on Hybrid theory is that of short, punchy songs with subjects usually about feeling downtrodden, paranoid or just being fed up with life.
Most of you that will read this will have listened to this band and abandoned them because you have “grown out” of them. You will probably have taken a sarcastic and superior stance against this style of music. Remember – it may sound dated now, but 5 years ago, this was groundbreaking. And once you realise that, and get past trying to analyse every lyric as a clichéd, unneeded emotional potboiler, that is there for the sake of appealing to the masses of angsty teens, you realise that there is a very mature element of feeling scared, forgotten and left behind in a world that can sometimes be very big, very scary, and very, very unfair.

I will now review the three tracks that I feel are the most important on the album in more depth.

Papercuts

Starting with a very clean and simple drum loop, and quickly moving into action within the first few seconds, Papercuts is an obvious choice for the album opener, giving us a peek towards what to expect, and showing exactly why Linkin park should not be underrated. The song is like a first chapter in a book, a character reference of the album contained in three minutes. This song is what the band is trying to say in the whole of Hybrid theory Mike Shinoda begins with his vocal stabs –

Why, why, night and day, some of these things I write today,
Why am I so uptight today?
Paranoia’s all I got left.

I know just what it feels like to have a voice in the back of my head.

Everybody has face inside, a face that awakes when I close my eyes, that watches every time I lie, laughs everytime I fall.

You’ve got a face on the inside too, you’re paranoia’s probably worse.

Everybody acts like the fact of the matter is that I can’t add up to what you can

This voice is the representation of all of our bad feelings about ourselves, whenever we do anything bad or immoral, the voice is there watching, waiting. Chester Bennigton’s chorus sums up the verses and meaning of the song –

It’s like I’m paranoid, looking over my back,
It’s like a whirlwind inside of my head,
It’s like I can’t stop what I’m hearing within,
It’s like a face inside, it’s right beneath my skin.

Linkin park have arrived.

In the end

This is a lot different to the main theme of the album, a lot more sombre. The song starts with a simple minor piano riff, with another mike Shinoda rap verse –

One thing, I don’t know why, it doesn’t even matter how hard you try,
keep that in mind, I designed this rhyme to explain in due time,
all I know, time is a valuable thing, watch it fly by as the pendulum swings,
watch it count down to the end of the day, the clock ticks life away,
it’s so unreal.

Things aren’t the way they were before. You wouldn’t even recognise me anymore

This song is about losing people, and not realising what’s happening until it’s too late. It’s probably Linkin park’s most lyrically strong song. The lyrics accompany the music and leave the listener with a sense of deep sadness and loss on the part of the lyricist. Chester Bennigton’s sung chorus once again sums up the song’s main theme, with guitars fully distorted:

I tried so hard, and got so far, but in the end, it doesn’t even matter.
I had to fall to lose it all, but in the end it doesn’t even matter.

The song is the most epic on the album, and shows a more tender side to the out and out anger displayed on songs such as one step closer, a place for my head and by myself

Forgotten

This is probably one of the best lyrical examples of Linkin park. The lyrics are written about life at night in an inner city, containing many double meanings and metaphors, running against the overall lyrical theme of being straight to the point. The song explodes into action from the first moments, all guns blazing, with a lyrical battle between mike Shinoda and Chester Bennigton forming the pre chorus –

CB: from the top to the bottom –
MS:  - bottom to top I stop,
CB: at the core I’ve forgotten –
MS: in the middle of my thoughts,
CB: taken far from my safety –
MS: the picture’s there,
CB: the memory won’t escape me –
MS: but why should I care?

Mike Shinoda then brings us another volley of rap verse:

There’s a place so dark, you can’t see the end,
skies cock back,
a shock that which can’t defend.

Then with the eyes shut,
looking through the rust and rotten dust,
a small spot of light floods the floor,
and pours over the rusted world of pretend,
and the eyes ease open, and it’s dark again.

Those last five lines are about hope. Hope that the world that they live in isn’t as bad as it seems, but in reality, it is often worse.

The band then launch into the lyrical battle pre-chorus, this time with the chorus from Chester Bennington after:

And the memory about me, eyes burning up,
the darkness holding me tightly, until the sun rises up

Next is a verse of Mike Shinoda rapping once more, these are my favourite Linkin park lyrics:

Moving all round, screaming of the ups and downs:
pollution manifested in perpetual sound.
The wheels go round, and the sunset creeps behind streetlamps,
Chainlink and concrete.
A little piece of paper with the picture drawn,
Flows on down the street until the wind is gone,
And the memory now is like the picture was then,
When the paper’s crumpled up, it can’t be perfect again.

Angsty? Immature? Too direct? I don’t think so. This song is proof against all the stereotypes and false accusations associated with this band. This song is lyrically excellent, and musically proficient, and no one has ever written as song like this before.

The song ends with a double chorus, and a shade of hope.

Other songs that deserve attention:

A place for my head – a song about being unappreciated by a loved one for good deeds done for them. The first verse is a very good example of the level of lyrical skill that Mike Shinoda is capable of.

Cure for the itch – the most detached song on the album. A short show-off tune, entirely composed by the band’s DJ Joseph Hahn. A humorous intro of vocal samples and the band messing about along with disc scratches and dirty beats is segued into a beautiful, simple synth horn section with a simple piano melody and broken, trippy beats. Gives one the impression of driving through a city at night.

Points of authority – a song about being abused by a self-righteous lover, who draws people in, and then uses them, before leaving them, and about how they will get their come-uppance one day.

The whole album is a clean cut, original journey through new century urban manic depression, with a tint of hope in songs like with you and pushes me away and total hopelessness in others such as in the end, crawling and Papercuts.

It is my firm conviction that there is not a weak or unnecessary song on this album. The whole album gets a solid 9.6 from me, and these songs:

Cure for the itch
A place for my head
Forgotten

Get a perfect 10.0 from me.

This album is essential, even if you don’t enjoy the music, as it album the started a whole new style of music and is truly original, which, in these dark ages of popular music, is something that is getting increasingly hard to come by.