Damn what's with all the hate on Imagine Dragons and twenty one pilots here? I think they're both incredible bands
You know what I hate about LP in general? That they never get the things across theywant to tell people. Like they say this album was lyrics first and they wanted to make the lyrics perfect and spent hours and days on "deep" lyrics and then wanted the music to reflect that. a) I don't consider lyrics that have so little parts to it (and don't get me started on "Heavy") deep and much less, hard to write. Same goes for the song. This sounds like something that Mike dabbled together in 5 minutes (and yes I do say that despite the fact that I like the song). Like if you keep that in mind, it sounds incredibly weak and boring IMO. Like from what I heard about the promises we have been made I would've expected a ATS2. Heck I think the lyrics to "Roads untraveled" are 'deeper' than the two we've heard so far.
My initial thoughts: Chester sounds great, extremely catchy, I will find myself singing this abnormally loud in my car when driving, instrumental seemed a little strange and could have been different but overall really enjoyed it. I would love to hear a song with Mike in it next. I wonder how his voice will deliver on this album. Furthermore, maybe it's just me but I'm really digging the vibe LP has this album cycle. They all just seem so incredibly happy about this album and its cycle recently and it's refreshing.
To be fair, I've listened to Battle Symphony more in three hours than I have Heavy in a month. Chester's vocals are brilliant, which is the song's only saving grace IMO. If this song were made by literally any other artist or band on earth, I'd never give it the light of day. 1000x this. Or even better, say "This record will be soft, accessible pop." Rather than pretending they're higher than musical "genre" by saying it's dead and releasing cookie-cutter pop jingles.
I agree on all of this except country. Nothing about country is interesting to me ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ BUT I used to say all pop was trash and now I listen to all sorts of different pop artists. Good shit
After hearing this song, I really want to hear a Chester / Chris Martin collaboration. I have to admit that I hate the "finger snap" sound LP seems to be using for these new songs.
There's a difference between hiring someone else to write your song and inviting other people to write songs with. Linkin Park did the latter for this album. They aren't a fan of the former. Either whatever you read was wrong or you misinterpreted it.
To people who say this song has nothing Linkin Parkish instrument wise, that intro sound that plays on multiple parts on the song and even ends the song with is pretty Linkin Parkish to me.
That's something I don't understand as well. So many people are complaining that the band has brought people to HELP with lyrics. What's the big deal? I think we can all admit that the band isn't good with lyrics. Like, at all. Face it, we're looking at a band with these examples of compelling lyrics: or or or By all accounts, the band is writing the melodies, the harmonies, the instrumentals, and recording everything themselves. What harm is it to get some people who actually KNOW how to write decent lyrics to help them refine their ideas? Based on the interviews we've heard and read, all the lyric ideas are coming from them and are something they care about. These are still THEIR songs. Some professionals being brought in to proofread isn't so bad, is it? Authors have editors that tell them what work and don't work and how to rework things all the time. Why doesn't anyone complain about that? Because it's still the AUTHOR'S work, after all. The same goes here. These two songs aren't automatically like the works of Walden or Tolkien or anything, but man they're a lot better than most of the lyrics we've heard from the band.
I'm resigned to the fact that I'm going to hate this album, but I don't expect to like every album from a band. Just not my cup of tea. Lyrically weak and sonically uninteresting for me.
At the same time I think that Roads Untraveled has amazing lyrics. Secondly I think that, while you're examples certainly are not LPs best lyrics, I think that the new ones are not better than the ones you mentioned, ESPECIALLY when they themselves say that they focused more in perfecting the lyrics. At least on the two songs we got in full it doesn't show at all.
Song is a meh, played once not playing it again till the whole album comes out. Read how many of you are in the belief that the new album would be a hotcake seller cause of the more poppy sound and the reception would be big. But I don't think that, sure it will out perform THP most likely, but let's be honest the very casual LP fan and not but casual fan will pass on it in terms of Albums sold. Ask a non fans what LP songs they can name and they will say HT and Meteora. That is the casual/non fan comfortable mindset on the "iconic-LP sound". Everyone has a exception to what a band/group should sound like. (Even if the band don't like that, hence the constant reinventing their style etc. and reintroducing the band to the world.) Just saw this (pic) made me laugh. Stop me if this has happened before with any LP song (maybe I never saw this) If I want to be cynical, I would say, not even the new song can get the radio stations attention and now they need fans to get "heavy" some more radio airtime. Sure some here will say, and even I believe that, radio is dead and kids these days go to youtube, itunes, spotify etc. to hear new stuff rather than the old school radio. But radio is still an important tool to get people interested in new stuff. So we can't just exclude their reach.
They can definitely write good lyrics sometimes. Burning in The Skies, The Little Things Give You Away, Castle of Glass, Blackout, and more have great lyrics.
Lyrics can be good even if they're not complex. Pretty much all lyrics are subjective to the listeners interpretation and whether or not they can relate to them. Even saying the lyrics "I wanna heal, I wanna feel" are bad, doesn't make them objectively bad.
I love pop music. I like Linkin Parks pop music. I didn't like Meteora and thought Waiting for the End was probably one of their most creative singles ever. This song sucks a bag of asses. And it doesn't suck because it's pop. It sucks because it's boring, uninspired pop that sounds like Linkin Park heard what 21 Pilots and Imagine Dragons were doing and wanted to try something similar. You guys remember when LPU CDs had the unfinished demos that were like the most bareboned versions of the album songs? This sounds like that. Not because there's not enough production on it, there's plenty of that, but it sounds like half an idea they just wanted to record for a frame of reference later. woof.