Hey there . I'm just new here, so firstly... hello! I bought the new issue of Kerrang today here in the UK and thought I'd post the review of "Meteora" for anyone who wants to see it. Well, thats me for the day. Byeeeeeeeeee. - Craig -------------------------------------------------------------- FALLING STARS Linkin Park - Meteora (WEA) [KKK] A QUICK note on the status in the industry foodchain of the humble music journalist: we hear it last, okay? And thanks to the increasing prevalence of 'leaked' albums on the web, we now hear it doubly last as labels have become increasingly reticent to part with advance copies for those radical media souls among us that -ye gods! - want to review and hence generate interest in their product. In the case of Linkin Park's 'Meteora' - the follow up to their multi-million selling debut'Hybrid Theory'this means the only way to review the album involves one single listen of the thing in the offices of their record company. While a security guard stands guard over you. You can't help but wonder, why the fuss? Follow-ups to mega-platinum phenomena have never measured up (see Kid Rock, Beastie Boys, the list goes on), with numetal follow-ups enjoying a particularly rough ride. And Linkin Park may have one of the roughest rides yet, because while 'Hybrid Theory' might have introduced young ears previously attuned to Britney pop to the delights of rock guitars (even slayer's Kerry King admitted they could be an elementary bridge to his band) they remain one of the most aggressively - and successfully - marketed examples of music as product in recent times. If 'Untouchables' was an expensive flop, then at least it came five albums into a long and illustrious career, built from years of groundwork. With 'Hybrid Theory', an album so perfectly crafted and so precisely targeted to satiate music buyers rather than music lovers, you can't help but wonder if there's any need for a Part 2. It turns out that Part 2 is here regardless since 'Meteora' sounds, given the circumstances, exactly as you'd expect a Linkin Park album to sound, right up to the Pro-Tooled hilt. Just like its predecessor in fact, which is where the disappointment lies. And it is a disappointment because if, as Chester Bennington recently claimed, the only pressure his band are under comes from themselves, then it appears the quintet have given themselves a pretty easy ride of it. As the tracks flit by, so do all the familiar LP motifs: instantly accessible songs full of crisp, bright riffs, tight vocal interplay, and a fastidious production that ensures that whatever sub genres or styles the band give a cursory nod to, nothing scuffs the gleaming surface. So, there are songs that flirt with metal ('Figure.09'), songs that are closer to hip-hop ('Session', 'Nobody's Listening'), songs that could gatecrash an N*sync party ('Numb'). What there are none of are any songs that surprise. Which is a shame because LP are an act that not only knows better, but has the resources to do better, to do, in fact anything they want. Yet new single, 'somewhere I Belong' is only the most generic of LP transmissions, while 'Hit The Floor"s stuttering rhythms and slinky bass action find themselves compromised by the most hackneyed of nu-metal couplets, 'One minute you're a rock starlAnd then it's all gone'. Which is frankly insulting. A couple of moments stand out: 'Faint"s Indian strings and hyperactive drum 'n' bass backbone recalls Outkast's 'Bombs Over Baghdad' floor shaker, while the '80s lilt of 'Breaking The Habit', which sounds like Don Henley in bed with Duran Duran, has to be applauded for sheer gall. Ultimately, however, 'Meteora"s reach appears to be a pretty unaffecting one. Your parents, and probably even grandparents wouldn't object to it. And neither will you. Which, for the potential 17million unit shifters among you out there, just might not be enough this time around.
Kerrang F-ing Sucks. Always have, always will. They consider themselves f*cking gods so they say whatever they want. I find it QUITE funny that Kerrang! says Meteora outright blows yet all other reviews say its a good album that's better then it's predecessor. And would Winamp and Launch! do a thing on Linkin Park if they sucked? I highly doubt it.
I've read this article on the german page of lp. It's a nice text, man... But there is no news about "Meteora" and I think, it doesn't matter now, 'cause the album is already out and I don't need anymore news...
the album is already out?? man, 03/24 or 03/25. "songs that could gatecrash an N*sync party ('Numb'). " lol thnx.
LOL LPFan! Kerrang is acting like all those cocky heavy metal bands out there. Its a trend, it seems, to diss Linkin Park as some 'mainstream nu-metal boyband'. Notice all the DEROGATORY terms at once! Mainstream just came to them since they are so great, nu-metal because they are not as hard as some metal bands, and boy band because this is a band that has a GOOD singer!! Chester has a great voice and I can only say that one vocalist in rock that is at his level is Serj Tankian of SOAD. Kerrang must feel so special.....