Linkin Park's Compassionate Thrash
They rant, they rage. But they keep it positive.

Posted Mar 29, 2001 12:00 AM

ROB SHEFFIELD
March 29, 2001

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/ … ate_thrash

"I love to hear the crowd sing along," Linkin Park vocalist Chester Bennington says backstage. "I get the biggest hard-on from that. Of course, it means I have an erection for a whole hour every night." He turns apologetically to Phoenix, the bassist. "I hit your bass with my dick last night. I still got the bruise." The last time Linkin Park played here in Columbus, Ohio, just a couple of months ago, they were the opening band; Papa Roach had the big dressing room, hed (p.e.) the tiny one, and Linkin Park had to settle for loitering in between. But that was before the L.A. rap-metal crew blew up nationwide with its debut album, Hybrid Theory, before radio and MTV turned "One Step Closer" into a teen-angst anthem. Tonight, Linkin Park are the band the kids want to see; the big room at the top of the stairs is theirs. "It's surreal," Bennington admits. "Like I'm gonna wake up and it's gonna be the longest dream I've ever had."

Linkin Park could have been designed in a laboratory as the consummate rap-metal band, circa 2001: the rage-filled vocals, the headbanging guitar, the renegades-of-funk rhythm section, the DJ scratching between verses, the shy, intense guitarist with the arty tastes, the baggy pants, the hair, the tattoos, the gratuitous use of the letter K. But although their heavy, aggressive sound gets them lumped in with bands like Korn and Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park are hardly the party commandos or death freaks you might expect. Instead, they're sensitive dudes who sing about the secret life of boys: the real-life emotional struggles of ordinary guys like themselves, hitting a nerve in the audience with their brotherly compassion. Like Papa Roach and Incubus, Linkin Park take pride in keeping it positive. For all the rage and fury in the music, they feel your pain.

In fact, they take positivity to some shocking extremes: Neither Bennington nor rapper Mike Shinoda utters a single curse word on Hybrid Theory. "When Mike and I sat down and wrote the lyrics," Bennington says, "we wanted to be as honest and open as we could. We wanted something people could connect with, not just vulgarity and violence. We didn't want to make a big point of not cussing, but we don't have to hide behind anything to show how tough we can be."

"It was scary in the beginning, when we started writing about what we felt," Shinoda says. "But once we realized we weren't the only ones who felt that way, once we saw the audience was coming along with us on that, it freed us up. We wanted to be a little more descriptive, instead of just going 'fuck' all the time. We wanted to go into detail." Adds Bennington, "In between the letters of the word fuck -- that's where we go. That's where we dig deep."

After every show, instead of an encore, Linkin Park jump into the crowd to shake hands and sign autographs. Many nights, they spend more time hanging out with fans than they do playing. It's been a long road trip; the current tour began last August, before the album came out, and nobody's sure when it will end, though the plan is to take a couple of weeks off next August, following Ozzfest. After six straight months in the tour bus, which they also share with their road crew, the boys are full of arcane road wisdom: For instance, if you buy the Big Mac Value Meal with the Filet o' Fish on the side, it's ten cents cheaper than buying the Filet o' Fish Value Meal with the Big Mac on the side. "We're shooting for the title of hardest-working band in America," Bennington boasts.

Tonight is Valentine's Day, and backstage in Columbus, in the big dressing room at the top of the stairs, the guys spend the last few minutes before showtime huddled around their cell phones, calling their girlfriends, wives and parents. It makes them feel a bit melancholy to be so far away. Out of nowhere, Shinoda starts singing Stevie Wonder's "I Just Called to Say I Love You," and the rest of the band joins in, discovering to their collective horror that they not only all know the words, but they can sing it in harmony, with Bennington hitting killer high notes. Thus refreshed, the guys take the stage for their hour of rock glory, rounding out the thirty-eight minutes of Hybrid Theory with some early songs from their debut EP, including the ferocious "High Voltage." The band jumps around and busts out arena-size moves for the club crowd. "Are you motherfuckers ready to rock?" Bennington screams. To no one's surprise, the motherfuckers are indeed ready to rock. After the last song, the whole band goes down into the crowd, shaking hands and hanging out until the last fan has gone home.

Linkin Park started up five years ago in Los Angeles, where Shinoda and guitarist Brad Delson, both twenty-three, were high school friends. DJ Joseph Hahn, also twenty-three, met Shinoda when both were studying illustration at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. They used to call themselves Hybrid Theory, until another band with the same name threatened to sue. Their vastly superior new name was chosen in tribute to Santa Monica's Lincoln Park, although they've since found to their delight that practically every town in America has its own Lincoln Park. Bennington, twenty-four, joined two years ago. He and his wife had just bought a house in his hometown of Phoenix, when a friend tipped him to the Linkin Park demo tape. Bennington flew to L.A., started jamming with the band and never left.

Delson, a UCLA grad who almost picked law school over the band, is Linkin Park's musical heart and is probably the main reason the band doesn't get lost in the shuffle of rap-metal bands. Onstage, he wears a big, clunky pair of headphones, but what he's listening to on them remains a fiercely guarded secret. ("Actually, I'm listening to the Lakers play," he confides.) His personal tastes range from Santana and Dave Matthews to artier DJ fare such as Tricky, DJ Shadow and Massive Attack. Hahn, the band's turntablist, also favors esoteric techno and hip-hop, especially Aphex Twin, Mixmaster Mike and Kid Koala; he's currently crazy about the Deltron 3000 album. Bassist Phoenix, twenty-two, and drummer Rob Bourdon, twenty-one, give the songs much more punch than the competition. Bourdon, a gentle soul even by drummer standards, is a funk maven who grew up on his folks' James Brown and Earth, Wind and Fire records. "Basically, I just like to bang the shit out of the drums," he admits.

"When we started, we wanted to play something that we weren't hearing," Shinoda says. "The first show I went to was Anthrax and Public Enemy. They did 'Bring the Noise' together, and I was like, 'That's the most amazing thing I've ever heard.' Everybody in our band -- and our fans, too -- has just been raised on different styles of music. Everybody's mixing everything. When you hear Redman do a song with Roni Size, or Busta Rhymes with Ozzy, you know something's happening."

Of course, in the past few years, rap-metal bands have spawned like gypsy-moth caterpillars. "By now, metal is rap metal," Shinoda says. "OutKast's new album is rap metal -- they have some awesome guitar solos." But Linkin Park's approach is distinctive enough to have struck a chord with the audience; their album made a shockingly high debut, at Number Sixteen, and hit platinum at warp speed. Now they find themselves dealing with the sudden bum-rush of fame. For instance, there is the minor matter of autographing breasts. "I don't sign breasts," Shinoda insists. "It's too creepy, especially when you don't know how old these girls really are. I did it the first few times I was asked, maybe five times, before I decided on the no-breast rule. But some of the other guys . . ."

"I figure I've signed enough boobies in my life to be done with boobies -- to sign, I mean," Bennington adds. The Linkin Park dudes are not much for rock & roll road excess; they don't even have any booze in their tour rider. "We have boundaries," Shinoda says. "If one of us wants to drink or smoke, we do it in the club, not in the bus, so people who don't want to drink or smoke can hang out in the bus." Bennington adds, "We're not a bunch of straight-edge goody-two-shoes, but we do have responsibilities to ourselves and our families and the people in this group, and we respect that. If you're getting wasted, you should be spending that energy out there meeting your fans. I love to get compliments from the janitors in the clubs - 'Dude, thanks for not destroying the place, I can go home early tonight.'" The band's big road vice is gambling, whiling away the hours on the bus playing blackjack, poker and acey-deucey. The roadies usually win.

"I guess our cover's blown -- we're not big, scary assholes," Shinoda says with a sigh. "People should just feel comfortable being normal. You don't have to put up a huge front to be in a band." Bennington interrupts him: "I do. Every day when I get ready, I look in the mirror and say, over and over again, 'Must become action figure. Must become action figure.'"

Bennington's special vice is clothes. He started the tour with fifteen pairs of shoes, but the reality of road life has forced him to downsize to his three favorite pairs. Offstage, he's virtually unrecognizable from his madman stage persona, guarded and thoughtful when discussing his own painful past: a childhood of sexual abuse, cocaine addiction in his teens.

"I think that's where a lot of the anger in my songs comes from," he says, choosing his words carefully. "I've never written a song about it, because I don't think it should matter to people. But I don't hide it, because I don't think you should ever be ashamed or afraid of who you are, or anything that's happened to you. Life is good, man. You can either feel like a victim all the time, or you can get off your ass and do what you want to do. If it helps kids to hear me talk about it, if they can relate, that's cool. But I'm just a regular guy, you know? There's no leotard and cape under my clothes. I shit, I piss, I drink too much and throw up, just like everybody else."

The next night, in Pittsburgh, Linkin Park are looking forward to a weekend off, their first in months. After the show, they're hitting the bus to make it to Newark Airport by 8 a.m. and fly home to L.A. for a couple of days. Tonight is the kind of gig the band has already grown too big for: The management is trying to shoo all the kids out at ten so it can turn the club into an over-twenty-one dance party at eleven. But the kids want to hang out after the show and soak up the vibe, and so does the band. When the management pushes the kids out the door, Linkin Park move out to the loading dock. Even though they all know the flight schedule, and even though they've all agreed to get on the bus and take off as fast as possible, the dudes are still hanging out on the sidewalk two hours later, signing ticket stubs, making small talk and freezing their asses off. Tonight, Linkin Park are the hardest-working band in America, and they're just letting the moment last.

'We wouldn't sign you for a million dollars'

Siobhan Grogan
Friday March 21, 2003

Linkin Park's first album was the world's best-selling record in 2001. Now, with nu-metal on the wane, their second album is about to hit the shops. Can they repeat the trick?

Siobhan Grogan
Friday March 21, 2003
The Guardian

Meteora rise: Linkin Park are (l-r) Dave Farrell, Rob Bourdon, Mike Shinoda, Brad Nelson, Chester Bennington and Joseph Hahan. Photo: Christopher Thomond

The man mountain at the door is frisking journalists as if they are entering a war zone rather than a playback of the new, hotly anticipated Linkin Park album, Meteora. Assuming (wrongly) that some of us have the wages and technical wherewithal to own mobiles capable of doing anything more than send a text message, he double-checks that we have left our phones behind before standing aside.

Welcome to the music industry in the 21st century. Paranoid and more than a little delusional, the powers that be are all too aware that a song leaked on to the internet before an album's release can be heard around the world in minutes. And so Linkin Park, on the brink of releasing their make-or-break second album, find themselves on uneasy middle ground, running scared of the very medium that got them here in the first place.

Article continues

Linkin Park are a truly modern success story. The six twentysomethings from southern California nurtured a flourishing internet fan base before signing a record deal. When they finally released their debut album, Hybrid Theory, it sold a staggering 14m copies, making it the world's bestselling album of 2001. Unofficial estimates suggest that figure would have been 20m were it not for internet piracy - which goes some way to explaining the security surrounding its follow-up.

The band members themselves will not be drawn into defending or even discussing this secrecy. Backstage at their Manchester concert - one of two low-key UK dates before the release of Meteora - there are amused smiles and a telling silence when security is mentioned. "Well, obviously, the record label feels that's what needs to be done. We can only say how we feel, and that's excited that people are hearing the record," vocalist Chester Bennington says finally. He's the owner of the almighty, angry roar that characterises Linkin Park songs, the one most likely to be pinned on teenage girls' walls and the one inclined to scowl exasperatedly at the prospect of an interview.

Preposterously skinny, he is wearing a light grey woollen zip-up top (some might even venture to call it a cardigan) over a white T-shirt and dark blue jeans. He has a shaved head and thick black glasses that seem less rock star, more nerdy student, and is polite but guarded, intent on answering only the questions he chooses - whether they are asked or not.

He is joined today by rapper Mike Shinoda and guitarist Brad Nelson, while bandmates DJ Joe Hahn, drummer Rob Bourdon and bassist Dave Farrell remain downstairs in catering, glued to The Simpsons and eating mashed potato.

Bennington, Shinoda and Nelson are trying to work out how to turn up the primitive electrical fire. The band's requested, distinctly American refreshments are laid out on a table at one end; bagels, bags of pretzels, bottles of Snapple. The room itself is decorated in the style of a particulary tasteless English living room, circa 1976. There are patterns on every surface, brown leather sofas and strange pictures hanging at peculiar angles, all to the obvious distress of Shinoda.

"That wall treatment is bullshit," he frowns from the sofa opposite, unaware of the implications of a fierce nu-metal band expressing interior design concerns. "And that picture should be at eye level, not hung in the middle of nowhere like that. And they need a rug," he notes earnestly, shaking his head. Nelson grins, radiating laid-back cheer, in contrast to Bennington's barely disguised wariness. Equally skinny, he wears a baseball cap sideways, sports chipped black nail varnish and looks barely 16, though he's actually 25.

In the country for just a few days, the three are keen to emphasise their reasons for playing two small shows before their arena tour later this year. "It's about giving back to our fans," says Bennington. "That's what this tour's about. We like playing smaller venues, but we know how many people want to come and see us so we don't ever want to stop anyone who wants to come to a show from coming. But these particular shows are all driven towards giving back to the kids who go out of their way to support the band. We made the decision to pay them back for what they've done by putting on this tour that is free for them and isn't sponsored by anyone. We're basically paying for it all."

Linkin Park were formed in 1996 as Hybrid Theory; Bennington was the last to join the band. "I listened to a demo and quit my job to meet five guys I didn't even know," he remembers. "Half of my family's income was removed because I wanted to do this."

It was his suggestion that the band take the name of America's most common park, misspell it and use it as an internet domain name. They posted MP3 files of their early songs on the site and asked for feedback. "We'd invite people from other websites and chat rooms to come check out our stuff, and every once in a while those people would say, 'Hey, when are you guys going to play?' And we'd go to a city close to us like Arizona and play."

Word spread and Linkin Park were soon besieged by requests for more tracks and promotional material. A so-called "street team" had formed all round the world before any record company was even interested. It will be these fans (collectively known as LP Underground) who are allowed in free tonight. Later, the 70 or so concerned will also meet the band. In New York, that number was closer to 1,000.

"We had these pockets of fans all over the place. They were small but they were so dedicated," Shinoda says. "We had groups of fans in places like Sweden who would ask for stickers and tapes and T-shirts to pass on."

Bennington chuckles. "We would have to do shows just to get some money to make stuff to send to kids. Then they would go see a band they liked where they knew that the kids that were in the show would like us too and they would leave early and stand outside handing out the tapes to everyone coming out."

Typically, the music industry was the last to catch on to the phenomenon. That still amuses the band today. They're not bitter, they say, but it certainly makes the success sweeter.

"We had the anti-buzz about us," Shinoda remembers. Bennington laughs. "People would say, 'Oh! You're going to see them? Good luck . . . What a way to waste a lunch hour.' But I didn't care if we didn't get signed because that just meant all those people in the record business didn't know what the hell they were doing and we didn't need those idiots. All I knew is that I would buy our record in a heartbeat."

Nelson agrees. "If we hadn't had that attitude, then we wouldn't have been here now, because we got turned down more than once by everyone."

"In some cases," says Bennington, "they would actually call and say, 'We wouldn't sign you guys for a fucking million dollars.' I'd be like, 'Wow! They really went out of their way to tell us they didn' t like us!' " He giggles his incongruous, little-boy laugh.

Linkin Park eventually wore down Warner Brothers and signed up, releasing Hybrid Theory soon after. "We clearly didn't expect it to do what it did," says Nelson. "We thought we would tour for a year or so and hopefully go gold or just maybe, best-case scenario, platinum. But we were playing music before anybody cared and before there was a single penny to be made out of it. It just means now we can focus all our energy on it."

An impassioned clash of rap and rock, Hybrid Theory was the sound of sheer teenage angst, albeit with choruses and no swearing. Singles like Crawling, In the End and One Step Closer became anthems for the burgeoning nu-metal scene already spearheaded by the likes of Limp Bizkit, though critics derided the band as being manufactured; too clean-living and attractive to be the genuine article.

"We don't care," says Bennington. "There's a lot of weird stuff said. When you're working for a magazine, that's your job. You have a deadline. You have to fill so many pages."

"By talking about it, we're just promoting it," adds Shinoda. "If you really want to know what the band's about, listen to the CD or come to the show or visit the website. You can't expect to know what we're about by reading about us in a magazine."

However much the band once benefited from the nu-metal association, they are similarly keen to distance themselves from it today, now that second albums from contemporaries such as Papa Roach and Korn have failed to set the charts alight. Bennington rolls his eyes. "To pigeonhole a genre as being successful or unsuccessful is weird. There's a lot of rock'n'roll bands out there that suck! OK? Like bar-driven music that is totally unoriginal and completely worthless. There's a lot of really bad rock out there, really bad R&B and really bad hip-hop. But every once in a while, you get someone who does something really new and original that no one's ever heard before and that's what makes music really great."

"What's funny," Shinoda notes, "is that we, like every one of those bad artists, are just trying to make something that's good! So we know we like what we're doing but we're sure our intentions are exactly the same as all of those artists who are awful."

Even if Meteora doesn't take off, they insist, they have already got what they wanted. "None of us got into this because we craved celebrity or even because we wanted the sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. We didn't get into it to get groupies or for ego-driven reasons. We got into it because we love music and we love playing music with people that we like," says Bennington.

Shinoda gets up to leave with a satisfied smile. "It's nauseatingly cute, don't you think?"

· Meteora is out on Monday on Warner Bros.

Jay-Z plus Linkin Park equals Fort Minor
?TRL? staple Mike Shinoda looks to highlight his hip-hop roots with solo debut

http://www.columbiachronicle.com/paper/arts.php?id=2081

By Todd BurboPrint
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Arts & Entertainment

When Linkin Park?s debut album ?Hybrid Theory? was released in 2000, it quickly became a staple of MTV?s ?Total Request Live,? sandwiched between pop artists such as Britney Spears and The Backstreet Boys. They earned their share of screaming teenage fans, and then, to the confusion of underground hip-hop fans, followed up with a series of high profile collaborations. They?ve worked with the likes of Jay-Z, The X-cutioners and Handsome Boy Modeling School, and now LP member Mike Shinoda wants to prove that he was worthy of such company. Under the moniker Fort Minor, Shinoda has enlisted even more top talent?including Chicago?s own Common?in an effort to silence any remaining doubts about his hip-hop credibililty.

Chronicle: Linkin Park was pretty dominant in the ?TRL? pop scene, but you also worked with underground icons like Lord Finesse and Handsome Boy Modeling School. How did you maintain that balance?

Mike Shinoda: Well, I?m friends with who I?m friends with. You know? They know where my heart?s at and that I?m a normal guy. I think what it comes down to is: Can you still just be yourself even though we get the attention that we do?

Would you call Fort Minor an attempt to distance yourself from Linkin Park?

I don?t mind the association so much as I want to just get back to those roots and show everybody what I do on my own. Although I am versatile and do different kinds of music, given the opportunity to do an album on my own, this is what I came up with.

The album is co-executive produced by Jay-Z.

I actually produced the record and mixed the record myself. I did every track. I played every note. I wrote every note. Actually, I think there?s one song that has a loop in it from a sound library, and a couple of kids online have been picking that out, like ?Does that mean that other stuff was taken from libraries?? No. Other than that, I wrote all the stuff on the record. Jay?s role as executive producer?he basically helped me decide which tracks are going to go on the album. Some tracks needed a little work, and some were ready as they were. So he helped me by making those decisions.

The album features a lot of live instrumentation. Would you say it sounds more like a hip-hop record or a rock record?

Well, one of my goals with the record was to use a lot of live instrumentation and a lot of live playing to maintain that big sound that hip-hop records have. It?s obviously a hip-hop record, but at the same time, I do what I know how to do. I try to play to my strengths, and that is to say I know how to write music, and I play a lot of different instruments. In keeping with the idea of trying to make that big sound, I did incorporate some live strings and a live choir on the record, which obviously I didn?t play or sing those parts, but I did write them. I think the general rule on the album is I did all the music, and if you hear any rapping, then whoever is rapping wrote it. But if you hear any singing, then I wrote it.

Are you enjoying getting back to slightly more intimate venues on tour?

Actually, I enjoy the arenas, but I am really excited to see the fans face-to-face and get the opportunity to actually spend some time with people. It?s been some time since we did that. I had joked with the guys [in Linkin Park] that I was going to write an album that I could go around and do some small shows with. I was going to write a bunch of pop-punk songs, and we were going to play in a joke band and put masks over our heads and play only 100- to 200-feet rooms. They thought the idea was funny, but obviously no one really went through with it.

The artistic design for Fort Minor is fairly similar to Linkin Park?s, and I?ve heard that you?re responsible for that.

I personally don?t think it?s similar, but I guess my style is my style. I did a series of paintings for the album. Because it?s my project, I really wanted to be as hands on as I could be on it. I did a good deal of the graphics on the record. As I said, I did 10 paintings, and those are basically the backbone of the artwork. One thing to note is that there aren?t really any photos of me, and if there are, my face is kind of obscured. One reason why I named the project Fort Minor instead of going by ?Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park,? and I put paintings instead of photos, is that I want people to focus on the music. I mean, people are finding out that this is my project, and the reason that I put these roadblocks between the two things is because I don?t want it to be out there as this mainstream success off of the name Linkin Park. I want to build it up as its own entity.

Will your show feature a live band?

Are you familiar with how Nine Inch Nails works? The similarities with Fort Minor and Nine Inch Nails is that in the studio, Trent Reznor is Nine Inch Nails and he leads the project. And then on stage, he leads the band. That?s pretty much how Fort Minor works. On stage, it?s me and three of the four guys from Styles of Beyond, a drummer named Beat Down and then three strings players and three backup vocalists.

Excellent. Anything else you?d like to say about the project?

If you?re curious abou the group, you have to see fortminor.com. I?m on there all the time; the Styles of Beyond guys and I post regularly.

Fort Minor will be performing with Little Brother at The House of Blues, 329 N. Dearborn St., on Jan. 29. Tickets are $21 and available at wwwticketmaster.com.

M: and thats where Chester's at
(focuses on Chester looking adorable lmao with no shirt on)
C: HI! (laughs)

D:Chesters in there completely naked...just sweating and disgusting.
(Chester walks out with only a pair of boxer briefs, Mike laughing at him and walking outta the door)
M: (Laughs) get the fuck outta here...
C:What?

R: Dunno why you kept those on? (looks at Chester's boxers)

C:Ooh a Fairy!

M:Hey Chester whats that thing your singing into?
C: A popper stopper

C: Im going back in, just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in
M: Im so sorry...I'm an asshole

M:(saying to Chester) Ok, so go home and we'll see you probably again soon...Yeah, dont leave to quickly, dont leave to quickly, I might need you

C:(banging on the drums)
M:See him smiling...thats because of that dope shit I spit in his ear
C:Man
M:See what Im saying

C: WE'RE GOING TO NEED THE MINI TRAMPOLINE!!

C: I said i liked the wind...I'm an asshole

Hahaha, this is cute lol...

Chester: I see the moshpits out there. I love that shit! You gotta love it when someone punches you in the face for fun.
Mike: But seriously, if someone falls down, you pick them up.
Chester: And then punch them in the face!

Mike to Chester

Mike: You know what I want to do on K-ROCK, besides what's going on in your dirty mind?

Another part that made me laugh was "metal licka" . The way he said it. l0l, Chester.

"Chester : I think someone just licked my belly bouton... that was weird
Mike [laugh] : I feel violated for you. Don't lick my belly bouton ... EVER !"

Mike: Projekt Revolution tip number 10...alway throw your underwear on the stage. [Smiles]

Phi: The bad part about this song...all you LP'ers out there if you make a mistake it repeats 6 times.

Brad: Hows my hair looking [Says while fluffing his hair up]...See it? A little extra fluffing...

Mike: Tip number 15...If your sick, dont give it to the band when you come to the meet and Greet...dont shake everybodies hand cause then the band gets sick and than the band cant play cause it's your fault.

Mike: Projekt Revolution tip 25...if you got warts on your hand...dont shake the bands hands, just don't do it. Just...wave, just say hi from a distance. This is Hi too *Waves to cam*

It was on MTV2 after the Reading festival in 2004. Jack Osbourne was interviewing Chester and Rob and it goes something like:

Chester: Hi Jack how are you?
Jack: I'm good how are you?
Chester: Good. It's been a couple of years since we saw you last.
Jack: I know. That night...on the beach. The sunset.
Chester: Just the two of us.
Jack: It was great. And the camp fire.
Chester: Shell fish. Lovely.
Jack: It was swell. And then Rob came in later.
Rob: I was the headliner that night.
Jack: Yeah you were. Oh yeah you were. You rocked my world baby!

That was from that Wiltern radio interview.

Stryker: When you and Chester are on the mic... it seems like you've known each other since you were kids. But you know, Chester came from Phoenix, so how and why do you think you guys vibe... ::laughter:: What happened?
Mike: That's your boy right there.
Brad: Chester came from Phoenix. Phoenix begot Chester.
Phi: I didn't birth Chester.
Stryker: I'm so confused!
Chester: Yeah. We have showered together, though. We do shower. And sometimes we bunk together.
Phi: But it's like a locker room.
Chester: Yeah, it's a locker room kinda shower thing, ya know. It's not weird... Hey, we're from California!
Mike: What was the question?

Это что ж за эпизод?
he looks so...ADORABLE in that lptv clip when he says that. and when he calls all the people who came out onstage "fuckers"
Chester: I just got cock and balls from a male stripper in my face on stage. It was great.

Phi: The-The stripper came back on stage.

After weathering a tussle with their studio, Linkin Park is ready to play
by Walter Tunis
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)
26 February 2008

http://www.popmatters.com/pm/news/artic … y-to-play/

It’s conference-call time.

On one end of the line, waiting for the telephone festivities to start, are the two frontmen for the multiplatinum, rap-rock, nu-metal, what-have-you band Linkin Park: singer Chester Bennington and rapper-emcee Mike Shinoda.

On the other are a pack of ravenous journalists, selfish predators that we are, each hoping to get in at least one question during the mass interview’s allotted 30 minutes.

Not exactly the ideal setting for a talk - and Linkin Park has a ton to chat about (or not) of late, from a well-publicized squabble and potential lawsuit with its record label, Warner Bros., to a collaboration with Rick Rubin, the star producer who has overseen records for Johnny Cash, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Tom Petty, Dixie Chicks, Neil Diamond and a dozen or so other stylistically diverse notables.

The setting has all the potential of a scrappy bar fight, except that nobody can see one another. When the session turns out to be orderly, the Linkin Park men seem almost disappointed.

“I thought it was going to be a free-for-all, with everybody talking at the same time,” Bennington says.

“That’s what I was hoping,” Shinoda says.

The first half of the conference call proceeds with few hurdles and even fewer revelations. Bennington and Shinoda are asked about everything except their music: How do you select your opening acts? What do you think of the new digital/downloading musical age? Are you giving tickets away for military personnel and their families again?

Finally, a reporter from Minneapolis brings up the dreaded words: Warner Bros. The air over the telephone lines - if there is such a thing - tightens. The promotional stance that the vocalists had been taking retreats, and the overall mood tenses a bit.

“We voiced our concerns back then,” Bennington says in a polite but affirmative tone. “I don’t want to get back into it at all.”

Get back into what? Well, here’s the deal. Since 2000, Linkin Park has sold roughly 50 million records worldwide. The band’s first two studio albums, “Hybrid Theory” and “Meteora,” were loud, angst-filled affairs that mixed arena-rock bravado, metal and rap with an accessibility that, at times, was downright poppish. They accounted for most of the big numbers. Then, when cost-cutting measures were implemented at Warner Bros. - specifically the Warner Music Group - Linkin Park sought release from its contract. Litigation seemed all but inevitable.

“Linkin Park has become increasingly concerned that WMG’s diminished resources will leave it unable to compete in today’s global music marketplace, resulting in a failure to live up to WMG’s fiduciary responsibility to market and promote Linkin Park,” the band said in a statement in May 2005.

But by year’s end, peace was declared. No real terms of the treaty were disclosed. But Linkin Park remained with Warner, and work on a third studio album was to commence.

Luckily, Bennington was in the mood to discuss that when my telephone time with him rolled around.

“I think where we were at was we were really hungry to make a record,” he says. “As much as we talk about how much time we like to be with our families and take off, it’s important for us to have a balance. The reality is that if we take even a week longer than we expected, it becomes uncomfortable.

“As much as a vacation sounds good or taking time to work through some issues, like we had with Warner Bros., it was also difficult for us. Once we got ready to make a record, we were very ready to make a record.”

The questions Linkin Park then faced were these: What musical direction should the new record take, and what producer should be enlisted to guide it? Once Rubin was brought on board, an answer to the first question became even more vital.

“Rick asked us, ‘What kind of record do you want to make?’ Shinoda says. “All six of us were like, ‘Pretty much something totally different.’ He was like, ‘Good, because that was what I was thinking.’”

So the members of Linkin Park - Bennington, Shinoda, guitarist Brad Delson, bassist David “Phoenix” Farrell, drummer Rob Bourdon and turntablist Joe Hahn - wrote. And wrote. And wrote. When they had what Bennington terms “100 bazillion songs,” Rubin went to work. What resulted was a more streamlined, less rap-savvy album called “Minutes to Midnight.”

The change of musical tactics was pronounced. Songs like “Valentine’s Day” and “Leave Out All the Rest” came off as radio-ready ballads, while crunchier rockers “No More Sorrow” and especially “Bleed It Out,” which were more in keeping with “Hybrid Theory” and “Meteora,” were wrapped in plentiful melodic hooks. Shoot, you could almost dance to them.

David Fricke of Rolling Stone magazine, in a four-star review of “Minutes to Midnight,” summed up the album and the pop age surrounding it in two sentences: “Rap rock is dead. Linkin Park are not because they were always more than the meager sum of that combination.”

Says Bennington: “We knew in our hearts that we wanted to make a record that was going to be a turning point for us, a kind of revamping (of) the band creatively and intellectually.

“We went in and did it. We took our time and we exhausted every avenue. We blazed new paths and tried new things. It was great. It was a great experience. And I think ‘Minutes to Midnight’ speaks for itself because of that.”
Tagged as: linkin park

Я не знаю, где он это говорил. Но точно не в блоге, потому что я там торчу с самого основания ))) Впервые я увидела эту фразу в одной подписи на оф форуме ЛП, потом ещё где-то в цитатах.

Свеженькое:

Chester: "Make some noise for Mike Shinoda. That is one fucking talented man right there."
Mike: "You're just saying that 'cause I got family in the house."
Chester: "And he's extremely handsome, too. Look at that guy."
Mike: "Hahahaha."
Chester: "You know, I can't say enough wonderful good things about Mike. I'm just glad he's in my band, you know what I'm saying?"
Mike: "You're terrible. The only reason you're saying that is because you lost a bet to me earlier. We were playing poker."
Chester: "I do owe you a lot of money so hopefully that takes off for about twenty bucks or something."
[Detroit, Michigan, 16th February 2008]

древнее интервью

Linkin Park's Magic Mix

BY RANDY ALBERTS

Onstage, Jan 1, 2002

If you think the aggressive, in-your-face refrain “Shut up when I'm talking to you” from Linkin Park's hit song “One Step Closer” is all that the band is about, listen again. There's a lot more to their blend of alternative, metal, hip-hop, and electronica than just singer Chester Bennington's high-energy vocals.

Mike Shinoda's deft MCing provides a streetwise counterpoint; guitarist Brad Delson's tuned-down power chords add a distorted backdrop; DJ Joe Hahn's tasty turntable scratches and sample work fill in the spaces; and drummer Rob Bourdon and bassist Phoenix contribute a thumping rhythm section.

Beyond musical prowess, Linkin Park's success is also built on a foundation of stellar songwriting. The tunefulness of the compositions on Hybrid Theory sets the band apart from many of their contemporaries. The band members also spend a great deal of time meticulously working out arrangements, which they re-create live with the aid of triggered samples and loops.

The guys in Linkin Park aren't just tight onstage; they're close on a personal level too. In fact, Shinoda, Bourdon, and Delson have been friends since their Southern California high school days. Their friendship has helped them persevere in the rough-and-tumble music world. “We all met as friends, and that's why we're still together as a band,” says Hahn. “We're all homies,” says Delson. Shinoda agrees: “We knew each other pretty well in school, but we definitely grew together this past year on the road. Knowing someone as well as I know Brad makes it as easy for me to say to him, ‘Hey, I don't like that guitar part,’ as it is to say, ‘Hey, bro, go take a shower.’”

During the past year, the band toured ceaselessly, and all the hard work has paid off in a big way. At the time of this writing, Hybrid Theory has been on the Billboard 200 album chart for almost a year, peaking at No. 7. The band participated in many of 2001's major tours (playing prominent supporting roles at Ozzfest and Family Values) and headlined their own excursions in the United States and Europe.

Linkin Park differs from many other bands in the degree of respect and attention that the members give their fans. The band regularly signs autographs and mixes with the crowd after a show, regardless of the venue's size. “It really doesn't matter,” says Shinoda, “as long as we get to go down into the crowd to sign stuff and hang out at some point after the show. That's arguably the most important part of the night.”

With a DVD project, a Hybrid Theory remix CD, and the next album planned for 2002, Linkin Park is poised for another busy year. And if they tour as much as they did in their rookie year — 325 days — they may single-handedly revive the slumping concert industry. I caught up with Shinoda, Hahn, and Delson just as Linkin Park was about to embark on a headlining tour of England, France, Germany, Holland, and Austria.

Does Hybrid Theory's success surprise you guys?

Shinoda: I can't even imagine who all those people buying the album are.

Hahn: I'm amazed at how many people have received our music. We are very blessed to have been given the opportunity to expose our music to so many different people.

The production and mix on the album are top-notch. Was it hard to translate the songs from Hybrid to a live situation?

Delson: The main challenge was working out all of the samples so that Rob and Joe could play all of them live.

Shinoda: Re-creating the sampled sounds onstage was really difficult, especially in the beginning. We had to figure out where to store all these samples and keyboard sounds. A lot of samplers that we considered didn't do all the things we needed them to do.

What solution did you come up with?

Delson: Rather than run a DAT, Joe uses two turntables and [Akai] MPC2000 samplers, and Rob uses drum triggers to incorporate all the sampled elements from the record.

Shinoda: We want to do everything live. Hearing sounds that you can't see being performed during a show has always been something we've wanted to avoid.

Joe, I understand that you take some custom vinyl on the tour to scratch in some of the sounds from Hybrid Theory.

Hahn: I custom-make my own sounds on vinyl so I can scratch exactly what I want. There's no limit to what sounds I can manipulate live. When we write songs, we're aware that we need to be able to perform live what's recorded.

Shinoda: Joe and I made an original record for him to scratch with certain key samples on it, and we pressed up 100 of them so that he can now scratch in certain samples from the record instead of just pressing them on a pad. There are some underlying looped materials, too, but all of the parts that grab your attention are played by hand. We recently upgraded to three samplers onstage, plus backups.

Anything else about your DJ rig you'd like to share, Joe?

Hahn: I use the Vestax PDX-2000 turntable because of its versatility. I run my records and manipulate guitar effects through a Rane mixer [see Fig. 1].

Brad, I have seen pictures of you wearing headphones while playing live. Are they for monitoring?

Delson: If I told you, I'd have to kill you.

Shinoda: Those are actually shooting-range headphones [for hearing protection] with sticker designs he has me do for him. Making the headphones is always a fun little thing for us, but we can get so serious about it.

Let's talk about sound checks. Different bands have varying approaches. How do you guys deal with them?

Shinoda: We know what it's like to get shafted by the headlining band and to battle with crappy sound during a show, so we try to be considerate and generally like to get offstage quickly.

Delson: We'll be using sound checks on the headline tour to work out some new and old material to incorporate into the set, songs like “My December” and “Carousel.”

What would you like to accomplish on the headlining European tour?

Delson: We are really excited about incorporating all of our new set and stage-production elements into the show. The band designed the new pieces with Michael Wetstone, who has worked with everyone from Korn to Eminem.

Shinoda: We all have a lot of pent-up aggression from the past few months, and we're planning to let it out. This upcoming tour includes some of the biggest venues we have played. We practically sold out London [Docklands] arena without announcing an opener, which is a first for us.

Will you be trying out new gear on the tour?

Delson: I'm using two extra Boss effects pedals, the Auto-Wah and the Phaser, to re-create the guitar sounds on another old song we'll be playing called “Step Up.”

What about new songs? Will you be adding anything to your repertoire?

Shinoda: We're planning to do some cool old songs, some songs that nobody's heard us play live before. We're going to play a couple of songs that aren't on Hybrid Theory — songs that can only be found online. You can find the MP3s if you ask around on the LinkinPark.com chat room or message board. We released 2,000 copies of a five-song demo made back when the band itself was actually named Hybrid Theory.

What was it like playing Ozzfest?

Delson: Ozzfest was like rock 'n' roll summer camp, but instead of eating lunch with the arts-and-crafts teacher, you're sitting there next to Ozzy Osbourne or the guys from Slipknot.

Shinoda: It was my first metal tour, so I wasn't that familiar with the mode of communication between the band and the crowd. Contrary to what I had believed, spit and middle fingers mean the crowd likes it, and I came home cursing more than I ever had in my life.

Did the number of bands create logistical difficulties?

Shinoda: As far as getting the gear onstage to play, Ozzfest was a nightmare. They used a turntable stage, and our guys had just 45 minutes to set up the entire stage. No sound check. It's like all the hassles of a radio promo show multiplied by two months. But everybody seemed to pull it off.

You guys tour a lot. Is it difficult being away from home so much?

Shinoda: The easiest way to get us in a bad mood is to start talking about being away from home a lot. We love being at home, so it's really hard — especially touring for 325 out of 365 days like we did last year. We do as much as we do with the fans because it helps remind us of what we're out there for. We're starting a fan club as a means of giving back. But not a normal fan club where you just get a T-shirt and newsletter.

How will it be different?

Shinoda: We're putting together an organization that will offer tons of exclusive stuff — like previews of new music, contests, chances to meet the band, and advance concert tickets. I can't even list all the things we want to do.

Life on the road can make even the most level-headed people do things they might not normally do, just to keep from going nuts. How about you guys?

Shinoda: We are generally very mellow, but when the crazy stuff happens we're like little 13-year-old pranksters.

How so?

Shinoda: I remember Chester mooning people up and down Bourbon Street, and Coby from Papa Roach jumping out of a bathroom and peeing on Phoenix [the bassist, not the town]. Joe convinced our bass tech to hang out in the hotel restaurant in his underwear once, and Chester and I have a thing for stealing golf carts.

Describe a typical day on the road.

Shinoda: Half the band sleeps later than one in the afternoon. Before they get up, the rest of us basically go off and do our own thing: eating, working out, shopping for records and knick-knacks. When I go out in the morning, I try to go sightseeing a little bit — even if that means just going to the local magazine store or mall. We have lunch together, then do some interviews, and usually meet with some fans. Then we drive to the venue, talk some more to the press, and then prepare for the show. After the show, we hang out with the fans for about an hour. Then there's usually a radio station meet-and-greet before we get back to the bus to watch movies, play video games, and record some music before we drive to the next city.

Talk about the next record.

Hahn: It'll be the next chapter in our growth as a band.

Shinoda: We all have criticisms about Hybrid Theory that will play a part in writing the next CD. I want to push the lyrics up a notch and make them a little more visual and challenging while combining some new, innovative electronic elements with our sound. The songwriting will still be tight, but you'll find a lot more complex writing going on. And Joe plans to say “fuck” all over it.

Do you guys ever jam or collaborate with other bands and musicians?

Delson: We're planning on releasing a remix CD in early 2002. We've brought out some of our favorite DJs, producers, and creative people to reinterpret and reconfigure songs from Hybrid Theory. [Artists such as] Jay Gordon from Orgy, Humble Brothers, Z-Trip, and DJ Crook from Team Sleep, to name a few.

Shinoda: There will be a lot of variety in the remix-CD lineup. Hopefully, the Crystal Method and Dilated Peoples will work with us too. We're not really into jamming, but collaborations outside the band happen occasionally. Joe and I did a track with X-Cutioners for Loud Records that I think will be out soon. It's a little more on the hip-hop side, but still has an aggressive, energetic feel to it.

Hahn: Chester just did a song with Cyclefly and also with DJ Lethal, and Mike and I just finished a track with the Visionaries too.

What music has influenced you, and what discs have been in your CD players lately?

Hahn: DJ-wise, I love the Invisibl Skratch Piklz and X-Cutioners. I also listen to DJ Shadow, Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, Tool, and Dr. Octagon.

Shinoda: I used to listen to a lot of Boogie Down Productions. KRS-One really grabbed me when I was just getting into hip-hop, partly because of the things he talked about and the stories he told. Right now I'm listening to System of a Down, Dilated Peoples, and the Start. There's so much music out there to like.

Delson: I have been listening to Dave Matthews, Deftones, Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, the Roots, Coldplay, and Tribe lately.

All of you guys seem very connected to your families and community. For instance, Chester is selling his car and donating the money to the Take Me Home animal-protection group. Do you do benefit concerts?

Shinoda: We all want to make the most of the opportunity we've being given, and that includes giving time and energy to groups that we like. We played a show early this past year that benefited breast cancer research, and we hope to do more for AIDS research and prevention groups.

Recently you've been on the road almost constantly. Any break in sight?

Shinoda: Right now I'm taking my first real vacation this year, yet every day of it, I'm working on our new Web site designs, our new DVD and remix CD, and the next album. We all feel very lucky that our hard work has paid off, and we're going to keep on working hard in hopes of continuing this way.