That T-Shirt

Moar ketchup.

 

"O hai. I have ketchup colored hair." -Mike

 

That fool was the year 2000. Even I had that color red hair back then.

I'm just not going to post a pic because I know Keaton/Joe will be a prick and photoshop it.

 

os neutral, you are fucking bat shit crazy. You try and make yourself seem high and mighty by putting yourself above people who like the record, citing that people who like it are lying to themselves and they are self deceiving. You come on to the forum, make these over-constructive threads, repeating the same thing over and over. It's hilarious to see you try and use big words you can't spell & out of context and then put yourself in the position of a psychologist studying peoples responses. Study this; You have no fucking clue what you're talking about.

We get it. You don't think LP have changed enough for your taste. You hate LP because they were proud of what they did for this record, I mean really? Bringing up the fact they were happy with how it turned out? They're not allowed to be proud of their work, because one, cynical, self-obsessed over-critical "fan" doesn't like it? That's bullshit. They never once proclaimed how amazing it was before it came out, they always spoke about how it was a change in direction FOR THEM, not music in general. They never "boasted" about how good it was, and that people would love it. They always said they hope people like it because they did, they knew people wouldn't like it, so don't put words in their mouths or other fans mouths.

...and oh shit, you bring up marketing? LOL. Welcome to the record industry, buddy. Media and press comes with the job. It's not a personal tactic to make people like the record on their part, it's business. It comes with the territory. It's not just LP, every artist promotes their work in some way. That part in particular made me laugh.

Generalizing LP fans into one category is the best thing you did. Projecting the new LP on themselves to make themselves feel good? You're way too over-analytical, and you're not even doing it in a constructive way. You never intended to have a discussion about this, you just came here (as you always do) to preach your pretentious philosophy on Linkin Park fans, and how much better it makes you for not liking this album and not following the mould of liking it for the sake of it.

Bringing up the t-shirt isn't even necessary at all. You're generalizing the fan base AGAIN. Not everyone uses the line "Try to catch up, motherfucker!" as a way to tell the "old" fans to catch up. I know I haven't and never would. Also, and for thr last time... The fucking t-shirt has nothing to do with the ideologies behind the line from WTCFM, it's to do with "catch up" rhyiming with "ketchup". You're holding Linkin Park responsible for fans' reactions to a line in a song? That's funny. What is it with you distinguishing "old" and "new" Linkin Park as well? There's no such thing, just Linkin Park.

To insinuate "Linkin Park" is some kind of a religion is interesting. It reflects you as an elitist who is rebelling against the power by not being with the majority, who you think blindly like the album. You're no visionary, you're no cult leader and you're not the first Hybrid Theory fan to not like the album, it's just other people don't have issues with people who do, or think that the whole liking of ATS is some sort of conspiracy, or deeper emotional response fans have no control over. They just take it for what it as and don't waste their time standing on a virtual soap-box, preaching to the "uninformed" masses like you do.

Nobody fucking cares if you like Linkin Park, but when you come here to make ridiculous, propaganda based assumptions on the majority of fans and Linkin Park themselves, it's insulting. You're not discussing, you ARE preaching, it IS easy to say that because it's true. I'm not saying it because it's easy to say as a dismissive reply, I'm saying it because it's fact.

Why do you fucking bother to come here? That's a good question. It's easy for you to dismiss our replies by putting yourself in this "researcher" role. It's to feed you self-inflamed ego. I don't really care, as I find it psychologically interesting on an academic level to observe how much of a pompous, uninformed, egotistical tool you are.

 

I'd QFT that but our shitty mobile skin doesn't support quoting.

 

I got ninja'd like hell by Joe, but here's my view:

I'm extremely sorry, but this one sentence completely discredited the rest of your post for me. LP "different musically" before ATS? Did you not hear Minutes To Midnight or Meteora? Even the band themselves all say that Meteora was a copycat of the first album, and apart from some experimentation with instruments and samples, wasn't really different from their first album. They even say this in interviews now. I haven't heard them call it by name for a while, they just call it "Hybrid Theory Part 2".

And as for Minutes, sure it was a decent record and a brave risk for the band...but it was still too safe. Many songs sounded like other artists (In Pieces like 311, Shadow of The Day like U2) and reviewers even said the album was Linkin Park "with an identity crisis".

ATS was the first record they've released since Reanimation that I feel distances them from other bands. This isn't me being a fan-boy or kissing the band's ass, but instead my own opinion. When ATS was being hyped up, few people knew that to me ATS was the make or break album for me with Linkin Park. I had followed their career for 10 years, respected them highly as musicians/people, but at the same time felt they weren't really challenging themselves musically. I had convinced myself that if ATS was a Minutes or Hybrid Theory clone, that it would be a challenge to keep supporting the band because I knew they were capable of more than what they were actually offering. Their demos proved this (LPU9) and to see them water down their music so much for the final product, was quite frankly...frustrating and annoying.

So when the message campaign came out, I knew LP was treating this album as different and I began to grow excited over the prospect of how the album might sound. With The Catalyst I was not disappointed. Name one top 40 act that sounds anything like The Catalyst? You say they have no musical identity with ATS, but then cite their highly commercialized older work as proof of your theory.

When even Phoenix says in the making of documentary that Linkin Park's old sound was too commercial (he called it "Linkin Parkifying" a song), perhaps it's reasonable to believe that the band felt their old sound was stale as well.

And for the record, Mike never wrote that line as an insult towards the fans that can't get over the change. He wrote it as a nod to the people at the record label that wanted another Hybrid Theory, and to the critics who continuously accuse them of having no musical integrity in every article they write. Mike has stated he doesn't want that line used towards the fans (and was even saddened that some misguided fans are doing that), but instead for people to actually listen to message of the song, which is all about the band firing back at the people who tried to hold them back over the years. Not their fans, but the magazine critics who called them manufactured, and the label heads who didn't want to release this album because it was too different.

In that one sentence you accuse LP of no longer being different, yet wish for them to return back to a sound that was not only highly copied by rock groups after Linkin Park made it big, but also is a product of an era of music that hasn't existed since around 2004. You're asking the band to completely de-value themselves musically, settle for just making another "Hybrid Theory" for the rest of their life, and not try risks that would've previously been unexpected with this band.

You make no sense. ATS might not be your cup of tea, but it sure is completely different than anything the band has done before...and in some instances different than what passes for music on the radio nowadays. The reason why ATS may not seem as successful as their older music is because it isn't commercial. Sure some songs would make great singles, but the music written on this album wasn't done with the intention of selling millions of records or making the fat cats up in the executive wing of Warner Brothers happy. It was done as an experiment by the band to make the music THEY wanted to make, without outside pressure from any other source. Where else would a song like The Catalyst fit? Certainly nowhere on any other Linkin Park record.

Sure, people are going to dislike this album, and I welcome them too. But in the same respect, I'm not going to make long-drawn out lecturing posts criticizing the band for making the music they want to make (like you're doing), or accuse them of being un-authentic because they strayed away from their older formula (which in many people's eyes could've been commercial suicide).

We dealt with people just like you when ATS came out. People who said LP wasn't an authentic band anymore because they changed their sound, or said that they ruined their career by making this album. It's not that Linkin Park don't have trust in their music, is that they didn't want to make the same record over and over again for the rest of their lives. They wanted to diversify and try new things even if it meant commercial suicide.

Watch this please and listen very closely to Chester's part at the end:
[youtube]ZIDaw0R0Fl0[/youtube]

This should explain why ATS was so different. No further discussion is even necessary. You can dislike the album, but if you don't understand why the band did what they did, despite them explaining it over and over again...I'm not so sure what else to say.

 

Is it just me or did os neutral just contradict everything he's been saying this entire thread in one post?