I agree. A Thousand Suns was such a mind blowing album for me, and this was just "eeh". What gets to me the most is that they said it was their most personal album yet but I really felt it was the least personal album they've made...It pretty much felt like they toned down the complexity of the lyrics and sound to appeal to a more widened, mainstream audience. I don't know I just feel like they could do better.
My biggest beef with this album is the lyrics. Some of the lyrics are really good (I'll Be Gone, Castle Of Glass, Powerless) but a lot of the other songs have some poor lyrics. That whole debate about LITE where Mike says ''Yall go hard, I go smart'' and then him saying ''Can't be stopped, all I know, go hard'' kind of irritates me to an extent for some reason. IMR had decent lyrics, but I feel the chorus could have been slightly better. BID again had decent verses, but wasn't too fond of the chorus lyrics, as well as Mike's rap lyrics. LGM was cool at first, but the lyrics are a bit cheesy, to be honest. Roads Untraveled has decent lyrics actually. I honestly do like STB's lyrics, but they are a bit repetitive and weird. I do like them though, I like how they are dark without saying much, it goes with the instrumental, in a weird way. UIB had lackluster lyrics, like LGM, the lyrics were a bit cheesy...
Same here - I didn't think much of it when it was first brought to my attention but, now, I find myself getting annoyed by that contradiction
About the lyrics, in LITE, I don't know what he's talking about at all, same with IMR and IBG. I don't know what's the point of BID, also. However, unlike the most of you, I like the lyrics of LGM and STB a lot. (Right to left, left to right, night to day, day to night - They're exactly the opposite, not meant to be together, the way I see it). And the lyrics of LGM, especially ''I wanna see you choke on your lies'', sounds really cool to me. It fits with that instrumental, and it's brilliant. Castle Of Glass, Powerless have the best lyrics. UIB is just Mike trying to be Chuck Norris, right? THAT's what sounds cheesy. The verse in Victimized is sick, the chorus is too simple. My opinion. EDIT: Totally forgot about RU. Forget about when I said CoG and Powerless have the best lyrics, RU has the best lyrics.
I had the same problem until I figured out that in the first verse, it's something like "Yall go hard (the hard way), I go smart (the smartest and easiest way)" and on the 2nd one it's "Can't be stopped, all I know, go hard (give everything, like "working hard")'' At least, this is what I think, and might sound stupid to others. But meh
I've kept my opinions to myself since the album release. As a whole, LT left me wanting more, bottom line. I'm hoping for a more cohesive album next cycle. ATS changed the way I listen to music. I approached LT with my expanded musical vocabulary, for lack of a better term, and I just felt generally unenthused. I wish it wasn't this way, because I genuinely anticipated LT and was very eager to hear it. It's just that after 3 months of analyzing and listening to it, it isn't really the type of music I want to hear at this point in my life. I want to stress that I absolutely adore Linkin Park, and I think that most of the members here know that. ATS changed my life and will always reverberate with me in an unexplainable way. I guess I was hoping LT would do the same. Needless to say, it didn't. Edit: That's not to say there weren't a few bright spots on the album that I enjoyed. COG, IMR, Tinfoil,Powerless I like very much. But the rest of the album is passable to me, just to be blunt.
Really? I couldn't disagree more. The songs on LT are the opposite of ballsy, it's LP going out out of their way to be as accessible as possible and castrating the music in the process. I watched "Meeting of ATS" the other night for the first time since it's realease, the attitude they had there was great. Phoenix talking about "ababcb" songs being boring and how writing a 3 minute lead single "didn't make sense", Chesters speech about not listening to all the "outside noise" of label reps, "forcing music to conform to that frame of mind.. is getting away from the song" etc, and just writing music, Mike not being "on some WID shit". From that to LT is just such an about face. Total 180. So yeah, along with the general weakness in the actual songwriting, the change in attitude is the most disappointing.
I agree and I disagree. I agree that LT was less ballsy in the idea that was less experimental. Less. . . I'm having issues finding the right words. Creative or unique is what I'm stabbing at I guess. But I also don't believe it was the band doing what the record label or "the outside world" wanted them to do. I think they just wanted to see what would happen when they put everything they had done together.
it's a fact that Living Things was more rushed than A Thousand Suns, has more poppy mainstream songs, has more simple radio friendly song structure, isn't as creative, etc etc etc I really hope LP shakes out of wanting to give the typical radio listener some music. They've done that with 4 out of their 5 albums. I hope they stop leaning towards what the label wants them to do, too. They seem to stray away from all that stuff i just mentioned with ATS, which was GREAT.
I see what you're saying, but I think he meant ballsy in like, packing a punch as far as the sound goes. And in that sense, sure this is a very ballsy album. A lot of the vocals are doubled, along with harmonies, lots of beats, and uptempo stuff.