"Session" - Song by Song, Let's Talk Linkin Park

Absolute banger. Love this song. I enjoyed the live performances but Chester was definitely struggling in the earlier days. That chorus is too good.

 

Good.

 

BURN IT DOWN
“The colours conflicted as the flames climbed into the clouds”
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Burn It Down is the third track found on Living Things. Mike Shinoda confirmed the new lead single on March 28, 2012, signifying the dawn of a new album cycle. The track was set for release on April 16, 2012. Fans were treated to a series of mysterious sliding puzzles on Linkin Park’s official website in order to unlock snippets and single artwork. These snippets were then revealed in shooting action game soon after. On April 15th, the band released the song online hours ahead of its radio premiere.

Needless to say, Burn It Down spread like wildfire across the airwaves, remaining on the US Billboard Hot 100 for over 20 weeks. It became Linkin Park’s most successful song in Poland and Luxembourg, reaching #1 and in Germany climbing to #2. It easily reached top of the throne on US Rock and Alternative charts as well. The single sold over 1,000,000 units in USA

Of course, before diving head on into the track, who could forget the infamous “Burn It Down Potato Recording”, causing the fanbase to dissect a recording of the song that was nearly impossible to decipher. (Unfortunately I cannot find a link to this leak, if anyone knows of one feel free to post it)

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“Buried At Sea” was the track’s demo title, revealing a completely different theme of water against the fire that the band ultimately settled upon. LPTV released a two-part series on the evolution of “Buried At Sea” into the finished single we all know. The vocals in the demo began as the standard “donna donna” melody found in Linkin Park’s newest writing process. Early lyrics were eventually revealed, and the differences are very interesting to behold:

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Chester Bennington spoke about the imminent single to MTV stating the following:

Reaching into Linkin Park’s seemingly endless well of infectious anthems, the band introduces Burn It Down with a delicate electronic synth that dances in the foreground. A brooding synth soon rises thereafter before bursting into an instrumental burdened with a massively distorted wall of electronic noise. It’s a powerful riff and yet the guitars are buried so far into the mix they are nearly inaudible under the monstrous synths.

Bennington is king of the microphone again, as he melodically arranges some vibrant verses over a simple drumbeat and a flowing synth. The powerful walls of noise return though, home for Bennington to belt out an ascending chorus packed full of energy. Shinoda grabs hold of his emcee reins once more for a commanding bridge, rapping for redemption while a swooning synth dances in the background. Burn It Down concludes the same way it began with the opening synth fading into the distance.

Lyrically, Burn It Down was actually written with an intended purpose by the band. Rather than relying on the audience to interpret their own scenarios, Shinoda has gone on the record to speak about the track’s motives as a representation of the constant uprising and downfall of popular culture. In the “Buried At Sea” LPTVs, the band members also make several references to relationships that burst into flames under the pressure.

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In an almost hilarious fashion, Burn It Down has been remixed countless times. The track has been fused with nearly every genre on the scene, from heavy metal to jazz. However, the House/Dance remixes have proven to be the most popular, with new mixes still releasing nearly two years later. There is a DJ Promo CD for the track with a stunning 7 separate remixes, including interpretations of the song that reach 8 minutes in length, effectively doubling the song in size.

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The music video for Burn It Down premiered on May 24, 2012. Directed by the band’s turntablist Joe Hahn, the video displayed several signature qualities found in past Linkin Park videos including slow-motion moments, 360-degree rotations, smoke, and special effects galore. The video contains no real story, instead relying on the band’s performance alone as they rock out in what Bennington referred to as an “electric pod, full of wires and cables”. The band members radiate a blue energy during the first half before lighting ablaze post-bridge. With over 88 million views on YouTube, the music video found incredible success.

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Burn It Down has been a live staple for the band since its first performance at Third Encore, California on May 16, 2012. Linkin Park followed up with several awards show performances. For the Honda Civic Tour, the song was commonly placed near the end of the main set, or as an encore opener, much like Lost In The Echo. The song is relatively successful on stage, although the vocals regularly prove to be demanding in the high-flying chorus, and Brad Delson is usually found nodding off due to the song having quite possibly the simplest guitar riff in history. Regardless of difficulties, the band made Burn It Down seem spectacular during the tour thanks to a pyrotechnics display, causing scorching flames to launch during the song.

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In a half joking manner, the band performed a ballsy Reggae version of the song for an LPU summit in Amsterdam on November 7, 2014, including soulful guitar intro by Delson, and completely different, faster Reggae delivery by Bennington on vocals. Shinoda’s rap was removed and replaced by a new synth solo.

During touring in 2014, Burn It Down has sometimes been played shortened, cutting the second verse and chorus completely in favour of more time to play other songs. Much to the dismay of hardcore fans, Burn It Down’s success has essentially cemented its rightful place on the setlist for years to come.

 

oh god.

Burn It Down. Maybe the most dancy track in LPs entire discography. I think that it was such succesful here in Germany is, because it was used at every game of the European Soccer Championship at german TV, and because, how i said, the dancy feeling. With much pop elements, this song also rocks a lot, especially in the chorus. I like this song, but i think because this song was so a big sucess and got many radioplay, it went down for me. The last time i listened to this song was on November the 9th in Oberhausen, so i dont choose too For me, it just ok, defintly not my favorite LT song, but for some evenings with friends a good one.

Also if its the most cringeworthy part of the song , i really dig Mikes rap

I play soldier/ you play king / And strucked me down / when i kissed this ring is a pretty clever line in my opinion. His flows is good here.

All in all, how i said, its the most dancy LP Album track and maybe that make the big sucess of the song. I think live the instruments fit better.

 

Okay, this song and ALTNC are the only reasons I regret stopping writing these posts. I was gonna shit on the remixes so much. Great post mate.

This wait for this song was the beginning of my total obsession with Linkin Park and everything surrounding the band. I had listened to the band since 2008, and somehow I knew Fort Minor even before that (thanks to a friend who was really into hip-hop), but I never knew there was a connection between the two. When that announcement of the single popped up on YouTube, I flipped my shit. Oh God. New Linkin Park song and album. Crazy. Now I get it was a bit silly but it was a great feeling for me. For some reason "Burn It Down" sounded like "A Place For My Head part II" to me. I couldn't wait for the puzzles. And when they started, I actually solved the first one, thinking I'd get like 30 seconds of the song or something, I mean... the dude promised previews. And then I realized... there's motherfucking sixteen of them. So a few days, and lot of "SUDO SOLVE"'s later, the puzzle was finally done. Previews? Nowhere. It was so frustrating. And then that stupid game with the triangles... I still don't get what I was supposed to do. And the previews he promised leak through radio stations. How dumb. But then it was finally released in full and I was excited for days after it.

It's actually funny how you mentioned that the track is a live staple much to the dismay of hardcore fans, kinda hinting hardcore fans don't like this song. I consider myself a hardxcore fan, and I fucking love it. I'm not gonna lie, there was a time when I hated it, but when The Hunting Party assured me that the future of Linkin Park isn't filled with Burn It Down-esque pop anthems, the song grew on me a lot (eh, to be really honest, I loved it even before that). While you could say Burn It Down is poppy and safe, I respect the track for just how electronic it is. It doesn't try to go back to the guitar-heavy roots (I know the guitar is audible, but it's not the key segment of the song), it doesn't try to satisfy the fanbase - it's just this fun radio song made to bring in new fans while not disappointing older fans. And that's okay. The synth work in this song is really great, in my opinion. The sampled drums work really well, and there's that drum glitch before the final chorus that's such a small, yet crucial element of the song. Sure, the lyrics are pretty bad, but rarely, rarely I like a song for it's lyrics. So yeah, I pretty much love this song.

And then the fucking remixes. I guess I only enjoy the Tom Swoon remix.

 

I missed some songs, so just some quick notes:

LITE: I used to think this was the route I wanted LP to go but quickly figured out that that would get boring quickly.
Overall decent rap rock song, love the chorus and Mike sounds so good on the bridge.

IMR: Great vocal performance from Chester. The synths on this track are very memorable(when they aren't drowned in the mix)
Unpopular opinion: The bridge is awful.


BID:
This song was a huge departure from the music they had created on ATS, so even through I used to like this song a lot, It still felt a bit disappointed that the band chose a much more radio aimed sound this time around.
BID is definitely a lot simpler than what I was expecting of the band at the moment but I honestly still can't hate the song too much.
The quite verses are beautiful and contrast the bombastic chorus in a good way.
My biggest problem with the song is the fact that it lacks any form of "edge".
It's just a generic dance poprock song without any surprises.

Mike's rap verse is pretty cheesy but I actually really like the line "Fan the flames as your blazes burn"

 

Burn It Down isn't a favorite of mine, but I don't dislike it. It's just a really cool kind of song, but not something with as much depth as other songs imo. I love the synth choices though. The bridge synth has to be my favorite from the song. I also love how layered the song is. It's not just "HERE ONE CATCHY SYNTH LINE", rather the synths complement each other and build each other up (to burn it down ). It's a song that I don't mind less guitar on. It's a really energetic song and I can definitely see why the band chose it as LT's lead single.

 

Burn it Down is simple and formulaic, and it's great. Every time it starts I find myself jumping around to the intro, and it's probably the song most people know by LP besides ITE and Numb around me. I can see why people don't like Mike's rap, but I think it's cool. To me, this is the best pick out of the more electronic LP songs (compared to ALTNC and STB mostly). I always compare the synth to CHVRCHES (Mike's least favorite band of all time ).

I wouldn't mind if we got more songs like BID. In fact, I hope LP7 gives us a BID 2, along with some variety just like LT.

 

So I've been slacking since I thought this was going to go to a slower pace;

LITE: Awesome way to open the song without an intro track. The opening track is supposed to establish the soundscape, and this accomplishes that. The synths and guitars are so kickass on it, lyrics are okay. The bridge is the best with the scratching, screaming, and rapping. The second half of the rap bridge is so powerful. But of course the bridge goes into just the guitar/vox part of the chorus and then the full chorus (they really do that too much). The video is nothing, the Facebook connection was a crappy gimmick, average story. Live, still great. The backing vocals give more layers to it. I don't care for much of Recharged, but this remix that it got is better than most of the others. I like it except for the drops, the electronics on it are really good.

IMR: Such an awesome song. The first 5 songs on LT are a great run of energy. Chester gives a great performance. The mixing just isn't good with the synths that don't have enough space. I like the bridge and backing vocals in it, most of the lyrics are good. Live, it got the Valentines Day treatment. I don't even know what that means but it makes sense. In this case, Chester had to work up to it, but it's such a challenging song with how the vocals range on it that they had to drop it. The synths are much better and louder live. They get used again on Mike's medley too!

BID: I remember the day it was announced and I posted on the Youtube video "I want a guitar solo from Brad!" and got the top comment. Especially from a heavy name like Burn it Down. So I was not expecting this electronic song, even after ATS. But I liked it, then it started to wear off, then I liked it more again. When it would play at work, it was always fun to dance to. Now after THP, it is wearing off on me again. Live, god I wish they would drop that but they just can't because it is too popular. It's their Creep now. Chester struggles too often in the chorus, at least in 2012 he did, but he is better at everything now. I would prefer their Reggae version or the aborted version that they did at Brazil in late 2014. The video is just a performance video with a plethora of effects. I was just disappointed that Brad did not deliver any good guitar on this song (or any of LT for that matter) but at least he does the synth solo live.


So is Faint gonna do all of them now? You seem to be doing pretty well but if you need a break let us know, I'm sure I could crank something out for IBG, LGM, or whatever since I only have one class for the next two weeks.

 

Is it?

 

It's really isn't. The guitar plays nothing but octaves during the heavier parts. I'm surprised at how many people believe the synths on this album to be guitars.

 

When I said riff I didn't really mean just guitar-wise. I know the guitar plays a simple octave riff, but I was referring to the heavy wall of synths. Maybe riff was the wrong phrase to use.

 

Riffs are most commonly associated with guitar. Most people will only associate it with such. "Synth riff" would have cleared it up.

It's only unforgivable if you say Skin to Bone has a guitar riff lol.

 

I meant that it's not powerful. I know it's a riff...

 

Forgot to mention Holding Company in my LITE portion; very good instrumental with a lot of layers, I'm interested in seeing how it became LITE other than them trying to lay down the same vocals. I love Iridescent so I'm cool with the similarities. And its cool how they worked it into the live shows as an intro for LITE

 

I'm beginning to get angry about everyone's hatred for Mike's new rap verses. Seriously I hate you all. There is no way the bridge is awful, the bridge is a great rap by Mike and the lyrics aren't cheesy at all, I can relate to them more than the LITE ones anyway.
Burn It Down was one of the first LP songs I heard, and it was immediately one of my favourites. I don't like it quite as much now (I prefer LITE) but it's still a great song. Like I said, nothing is bad in LT (*coughs* length of Victimised *cough*) for me, so I'm not going to put anything negative in my posts for a couple of weeks

 

Jesus Christ, stop hating people 'cause they dislike certain elements of Linkin Park. It's so dumb. We're all here cause we are fans, we are allowed to dislike music though.

 

BID blows. Quite possibly the worst song they've written. Trite, formulaic, aimed-at-radio nonsense. Lyrically vapid, like most of the rest of the album.

Would not recommend.