I wouldn't say I've been 'underwhelmed' by the last three albums (since I prefer them as a whole to the first three), but I definitely agree that since we got A Thousand Suns, everything afterwards has felt so tame. The songs are still really, really good (imo), and I've had great fun with OML, but it just seems like the band are focussed on writing great songs rather than pushing what they're capable of. Which is fine, that's their prerogative and they have no obligation to do otherwise, but I feel like often the band conflates a sonic shift with pushing themselves as composers. Maybe some people exaggerate how experimental the album is, but for me that's not really the point. The beauty of ATS to me is that it does retain some pop sensibilities, with catchy choruses, simple instrumental parts, and a healthy dose of repetition from time to time, while also mixing that in with 6 interludes, unusual and sometimes beautiful (Robot Boy) instrumental textures (screaming over piano, rapping over tribal drums, etc.), and (slightly) longer songs with more lengthy, developed sections (particularily the outros of WTCFM, Blackout and The Catalyst). Of course no matter how experimental an album is, you can always find one that's more experimental, but compared to the rest of LP's output, it's the only album that even attempts to lift the 'LP songwriting formula'. Put another way, I think what most of us mean isn't so much 'eschewing conventional songwriting' in general, but more 'eschewing conventional Linkin Park songwriting'.
I'm going to probably be the unpopular opinion but I think One More Light was a step in the right direction in the sense that it revived the varied sound that THP was sorely lacking. My big issue with THP is how same-y it starts to sound after a few listens. Ever since OML came out, I've not revisited THP because I feel there's more variation in sounds on OML (mid tempo pop songs like Battle Symphony and Nobody Can Save Me, upbeat rock with Talking To Myself, hip hop elements on Halfway Right and country elements on Sharp Edges).
That's funny because I feel the complete opposite. One More Light is sorely lacking in variety apart from the last third or so. I feel like there's more variety in The Hunting Party (post-hardcore in Keys to the Kingdom, alternative in All For Nothing/Final Masquerade, metal in Guilty All The Same, punk in War, alt-metal in Rebellion, progressive in Mark the Graves/A Line in the Sand, nu-metal in Wastelands)
In regards to music in general, yes. In regards to the rest of the band's discography, it's clearly the most "trying to make something entirely new than everything else we've done" album. Even if LT/THP/OML came out before ATS, it would still sound like the band made an effort to try as many new things as they could. And nah, they won't stick with the OML formula. Even if they make another poppy album, it's gonna have some dramatically different stuff, like a different "raw" tone, varying song structure, a bigger focus on rap/hip-hop, a focus on "drops", a lot less vocal sampling, something that makes it feel at least more different from OML than HT/Meteora.
I actually agree with this in a way. A Thousand Suns did for sure have some pop sensibilities within the music. All of the band's albums have, to be fair. It's definitely the most experimental and mature sounding album in the band's discography for sure, but there are a lot of other albums in the world of music that are similar in nature that push it way farther than A Thousand Suns did. I don't even like A Thousand Suns at all, but sometimes, I wonder how Linkin Park was able to make an album like that, and then go back to making music like Living Things, The Hunting Party and One More Light. I guess that just shows that Linkin Park really worked hard on A Thousand Suns. But yeah. In the world of music, A Thousand Suns is barely experimental compared to many other albums from other artists, for sure, there's no arguing that. It's still a Linkin Park album at the end of the day. LOL. But for Linkin Park themselves, it's definitely their most experimental and mature album out of their discography.
I think the default point of A Thousand Suns being unconventional for Linkin Park, in terms of songwriting as a whole, is about as fair as it gets. Perhaps it has to do with limitations in my discography, but I really can't think of much that sounds like what Linkin Park did on that album. There's a real eclectic mix on that album sonically that I think is really, really outstanding for an album that otherwise has the cohesiveness that it does (in terms of musical and lyrical themes). I don't think there necessarily is such thing as an atypical song structure anymore - you can have no lyrics, or say one word one time all throughout the song, or have no chorus - whatever, it's all been done. I think ATS certainly defied the typical verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus that Linkin Park religiously stuck to up until that point, which so many bands go for, so I don't think it's unfair to say that it eschews conventional songwriting - it's just not as much as people make it out to be. But I think Iopia sums it up really well in terms of what this album did, and no album rivals it as a result - for me, at least.
I'd have to agree with you. Many bands have tried to imitate Linkin Park's other sounds, (and vice versa) but I honestly can't think of another album anywhere that captures the core sound of A Thousand Suns. It is uniquely theirs. I've been really digging into classic rock bands from the 60's-70's such as the Beatles, Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd and A Thousand Suns really channels that psychedelic acid rock feeling but into a modern, electronic rhythm while still being catchy as fuck. I don't mean to compare the quality of the album to those legends but after seven years it still feels insanely fresh with each listen. Touche good sir. However in my opinion OML still has less variety.
In the context of the discography, this is a valid point to argue if you have to make a comparison. Maybe it is relatively less varied against ATS or whatever, but that's almost just semantics - OML is still extremely varied, IMO, even if other albums are a little more so. It has the same kind of grab-bag feel as "Living Things".
I think as a whole, OML sounds much more cohesive than Living Things. Even the worst songs on the album feel like they still fit in, it's just that they're the worst at what they were trying to achieve.