A Thousand Suns of Improvements

Holy canoli, it’s been so long since I posted anything on here. Well Linkin Park dropped their new album and I’ve listened to it enough times to talk about the album and Mike.

First off, we have the best opening three tracks in music history. “The Requiem”, “The Radiance”, “Burning In the Skies”. Eerie, beautiful, and well-thought out. I was extremely impressed and just so…shocked by how good it sounded. Now let’s skip forward to…

“”When They Come for Me”. This song has Mike spitting rhymes like he’s some hardass rapper who has made a name for himself. OH WAIT.

I am not a pattern to be followed
The pill that I’m on is a tough one to swallow
I’m not a criminal, not a role model
Not a born leader, I’m a tough act to follow
I am not the fortune and the fame
Or the same person telling you to forfeit the game
I came in the ring like a dog on a chain
And found out the underbelly’s sicker than it seems
And it seems ugly but it can get worse
Because even a blueprint is a gift and a curse
Because once you got a theory of how the thing works
Everybody wants the next thing to be like the first
And I’m not a robot, I’m not a monkey
I will not dance even if the beat’s funky
Opposite of lazy, far from a punk
Ya’ll ought to stop talking and start trying to catch up motherfucker

Whoa. Okay Mike. You not too happy your older fans want more Hybrid Theory and Meteora and less…whatever this experimental stuff is? WELL DEAL. Let me add here that in “Meeting of A Thousand Suns” Mike says, “I don’t want any What I’ve Done shit.”

Well now, Kenjichan. “What I’ve Done” is one of the best songs you guys have ever made. Period. You might want some of that in the future.

Overall musically, the song has sweet drum beats that sound as if Rob spent some time in an African-American heritage festival too long. Possible, since he’s into funk and other stuff native to black people…except rap.

Next we have “Blackout” which is a catchy techno-style song with lots of screaming. It makes me happy to listen to because Chaz is…screaming. Old school style.

“Wretches and Kings” features Mike’s latest identity crisis: being Jamaican. Good lord, someone take this boy back to Agoura and remind him of his roots in California. Why does he seriously sound like he’s trying to be reggaeton and draggin Chaz along with him? It’s pathetic really, because screamo reggae will never catch on like ska.

I skipped “Waiting for the End” because it’s not that impressive and it’s more of Mike trying to become Jamaican (“I’m white! No, I’m Japanese! No, I’m white! No, I’m both! No way, I’m black! Nah, I’m actually just white and Japanese. NO I’M JAMAICAN MON!”). However, whenever Chaz is singing, the song sounds extremely peaceful and more along the lines of Dido than anything, really.

The Catalyst is the posterchild song from the album and really showcases everyone’s talents…except Mike’s of course. I actually keep forgetting there’s piano in the song. He contributes vocals (also, the whole band does some choir work. Sounds BEAST) and plays piano. Yeah…whatever. ANYWAYS…the song is amazing. I always start anger-dancing-to-summon-the-rain when I listen to it and have some sort of high right at the midpoint before it begins to breakdown.

Damn straight.

That’s all that has to be said about the album, really. Imagine if Gorillaz decided to try nu-metal. It would sound like this, unfortunately. But Gorillaz has enough street cred to work with Snoop, so I don’t know what that has to say about them.

Bonus: “Wisdom, Justice, and Love” is just a little piano plus Martin Luther King Jr. speaking about Vietnam. Possibly the best not-actually-a-song track on the album. No, definitely. It IS. I get chills every time I hear it.

So Mike Shinoda, please please PLEASE stop having identity crises. It’s bad enough you all went back to Rick; but now you act all butthurt when Brad’s being an ass. Awww. Is he distracting Chaz? Deal with it, you pussy.

The guys seemed to have less fun on this album (especially Brad. You know Rob’s happy as long as he has a drum kit and Joe’s just “meh”). That’s kind of disappointing and depressing, because their making of stuff is always so hilarious and this time they were arguing about deadlines, being butthurt, and Brad asked them to turn the camera off at one point. Whoa.

Just FYI: there’s a Tap tap Revenge app just for Linkin Park now. It’s awesome. Worth the money. The album is worth about $10.