I actually got the quote wrong - it's actually "real melodies and real lyrics" ... but I guess that you could say I was just paraphrasing. I feel that he's been going roughly in the right direction since "A Thousand Suns". If he was just a little more creative with meter and added just a little more internal rhyming, I think it'd be okay.
Um, what? Mike's shown some of his best rap deliveries within the last 3 album cycles. Everything off of HT, Meteora, and TRT were just plain bland. Sure, for their time they were quite impressive when we were all kids or teens, but now it seems as tho Mike actually puts thought into his delivery, content and speed which has worked greatly to his advantage. Songs like AFN, UIB, WTCFM, IHNB, STB remix, Welcome, etc absolutely show it. Then on the other hand you claim he's an excellent singer? Don't make me laugh, bro. Studio has its advantages, *cough* pitch correction *cough*. Apart from that, If you think his live singing is "excellent", then you must also believe Oliver Sykes is the next Freddy Mercury.
None of those songs you mentioned are particularly great in terms of his rapping. WTCFM is probably the best work he's ever done, and it's very good, but it's not amazing, and AFN is just cringey.
That's what I think, too. He might not be the best rapper technically, but he fits the best in LP's songs and completes them. Though I have to admit I would like him to do a bit less of "tough guy"-rapping.
I don't know what expect about the direction of the next album, but i won't more electronic please. Mike Shinoda with Martin Garrix on the studio... you know...
Yeah, this. WTCFM is fucking impressive, Victimized aswell (although it'd be really impressive to fuck up 8 bars). Most of those songs are just okay, UIB being another great one. But that's what? 6 verses through 5 years? I get 6 great verses in a single Kendrick Lamar song. Pitch correction and shit or not, Shinoda conveys emotion in his singing. His delivery of every line is great and he can obviously write better lyrics for sung verses than rapped ones. I mean, compare stuff like "Devil's Drop" to "Wastelands". We're talking amazing imagery, few metaphores, real emotion vs. "John with no Yoko, more power less people". And Oliver Sykes is not the next Freddie Mercury. He's the next Luciano Pavarotti.
I always thought a great example of his singin was P5hng Me A*wy on Live in Texas, the verse is short but I always loved his delivery on it.
What can we expect? Hype, buzzwords, trolling. And some new music. Plus hopefully a Making Of DVD that gets released on or at least close to the time the album drops. That would be nice.
Just thinking about this today. Don't particularly mind what sound they decide to pursue on LP7, but please please please please please let the lyrics be decent. It seemed that Mike and Chester were really developing as lyricists up until ATS, after which they decided to stop giving them as much thought. There are still some really strong lyrics on their last two albums (CoG, RU, and Rebellion spring to mind), so they can still clearly write good lyrics, but it just feels much less consistent than I'd like it to be. It's sort of a minor point, I'd take strong music over strong lyrics any day, but having both would still be great. (At least there's not that much really on LT/THP that's cringeworthy bad, so that's a plus).
For me, personally, lyrics are more important when it comes to saying whether a Linkin Park song is good or not. So, before "A Thousand Suns", there were only a small handful of good LP songs to me.
I would think given the recent revival of FM that Mike would have produced some hip-hop influenced material for this next album. If that is the case it may or may not remain in the final product, given the major U-turn LP pulled with the making of THP (going from indie pop demos to rock), I don't know what to expect. Though I think it's fair to say they're warming up to the initiative of undertaking more collaborations with other artists. Mike already mentioned that LP is collaborating with someone in London, who that is we're not sure. Needless to say I would not be surprised if LP7 had some more features. Also given that LP had their dose of guitar riffage from the last album I would think LP7 is leaning more towards the electronic side, and seeing as how Mike incorporated some elements in Welcome which are trendy nowadays, that could happen with a couple of songs on LP7 too.
Once again, similar to their old style but much more refined. [video=youtube;e2U0PoEfcDg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2U0PoEfcDg[/video] I wish this could've been the actual LP song instead