If they release new music I hope it's not a continuation of Mike's solo stuff. Especially his recent singles were terrible imo. Instead I hope it'd be more creative in the same vein as ATS or even something like Sleep Token or BMTH.
I would agree that Runaway's lyrics are what a teenager's problems would be, but for a young person they are real.
I could see In My Head and Already Over being fairly indicative of new LP music. I would love something more experimental, but I'd be somewhat surprised if new LP (at least, a new lead single) isn't a reasonably safe mix of rock and electronic elements with a conventional song structure and a big chorus, with some rapping from Mike to make it feel more like the Linkin Park we currently know. Something like Burn It Down, Lost in the Echo, Bleed it Out, or Somewhere I Belong. I could be wrong, but that's my guess.
I don't understand how anyone can call Meteora their worst album when One More Light exists Despite my curiosity around this announcement, I am keeping expectations at a bare minimum as far as the quality of new music that might come our way. Unfortunately I have not really enjoyed anything the band put out since ATS. The band shamelessly going generic radio pop in OML was the nail in the coffin for me. I haven't been impressed with Mike's solo work post-OML either. Hopefully this 7 year break has helped them feel rejuvenated creatively.
One More Light is gorgeous in my opinion. I'd rank it above Meteora, Living Things, The Hunting Party, and depending on the day, maybe even Hybrid Theory. It doesn't surpass ATS/MTM/Reanimation though.
Personally, I think every post-ATS albums has had really cool highlights (Castle Of Glass, Until it breaks, Keys to the Kingdom, GATS, Invisible, OML), but I would agree that as cohesive and consistent entity, nothing has come close to the first 4 albums. And OML has been by far my less favorite of the bunch. However, I am somewhat enthusiastic that this come back could bring something much more special than in the last 15 years. And even if it's not, i'll probably still enjoy it and be all happy the band is active again ^^
I also prefer OML to LT and THP. I still maintain those albums felt a little rushed due to the band's attempt to release albums on a 2-year schedule at the time. On paper they're both albums I should love, but there're just too many moments I don't care for on both. It's hard to articulate exactly what my issues are in a single short(ish) post, but roughly speaking, LT's arrangements (and mixing) still hurt my ears 12 years on, and I never really cared for the wall-of-guitar 'firecracker' approach throughout the album's first half, and THP just has too many parts that feel a little clunky to me, especially vocally. On the other hand, to me One More Light consistently features some of the strongest melodies the band ever wrote, with beautiful production on top. Sure, on paper, it doesn't have the diversity I loved from previous LP albums, but I just think it's a better written album than their previous two efforts. Getting back on topic, my two least favourite LP albums are the ones that were written and released most quickly after their predecessors in an attempt to release new music on a regular schdeule. So, if the band has written a new album for 2024/2025, I'm very hopeful that they've taken as much time as they need to make sure that every song is as well constructed as possible.
OML has some solid songwriting, but I'm just not a fan of the helium sound effects they use in half of the songs. LT grew into one of my favourites through the last few years, next to my all time favs MTM and ATS. I'm very curious what the (potential) new song will sound like. My guess would be something close to Burning In The Skies or Running From My Shadow.
The way this thread is bubbling sideways is making me think the forum needs a new retrospective thread for the occasion, or to continue an existing one. MTM was the last album to leave me fully satisfied. But I LOVE their ambition to try other sounds in a fully committed love of music, as core to their musical identity. If you’re asking me, it was never about the sound as to why I feel this way. Each album after felt like it wanted to go somewhere it only managed to make it most of the way to. Even ATS.
It's not too sideways to discuss the last effort in context of an upcoming one. It's only natural to ponder how much seven years will change their sound. This is the longest break they've ever had between albums, MS solo content aside.
True! It just felt like we’re starting to geek out on discography a bit more than speculate on Sept 5th. I imagine it’s pretty lax right now because of the circumstances, anyway.
I find the music after ATS to be hit or miss a lot personally. Living Things is my least favorite record from them. The Hunting Party was a step in the right direction but I’d go back to maybe 5 songs at this point. One More Light has an air of darkness that makes it harder to listen to for me, and while there are some incredible highs, there’s also a lot that feels stuck in 2017 for the worst. I still appreciate a lot of Mike’s solo work. I don’t think there’s a song he’s done that’s as raw as Over Again, and there are some bangers off Post Traumatic and that Ziggurats tape. But a lot of those one-off singles he’s released have been very forgettable to me.
It's actually surprising to see that the opinion on OML is now fairly mixed (and very polarized, it's either considered one of the worst or one of the best albums from the band), while it was I'd say 70/80% negative when it was released. I loved it a lot in 2017, but I also do not return much to it nowdays. I still believe there are really strong songs in there, like NCSM (wonderful, lovely guitar work and arrangement), Invisible, Sorry For Now and the title track. After all this years, I'd rank it somewhere in the lower end of an album ranking, but I still would rate it like a solid 7/10? I do believe that, if Chester hadn't passed away, OML would have become some kind of "transitional" album to the band's next step, in the vein of MTM. They had just started changing up their songwriting process, who knows what could have been. Pop significantly changed around 2019/20, got darker in sound and themes for a while, now it's changing again and there's so much interesting stuff in there. Sometimes I do wonder how LP would have adapted to those shifts.
Yeah, I was all over it back when it was new. It fit neatly into what I was listening to back then, and that was never the case for most LP album releases. I'm definitely less generous towards it now, and I owe that partly to not being so deep in all the LP fan chatter for the last few years
Interesting - I would argue this is the same reason why I'm much more positive towards the album than most. Most fan discourse I've seen over the past 7 years has solidly considered OML their worst album. I think the fact that I haven't engaged as much with fan discourse over the past 7 years has allowed me to appraise the album outside of the context of what the fan base expects Linkin Park to sound like (or put another way, outside of the context of the type of music most Linkin Park fans consider 'good').