He's coming at Linkin Park from the angle of "New Sincerity," a burgeoning critical movement that values conveyance of honest emotion above all else. This movement has emerged due to our media culture currently being steeped in sarcasm, cynicism, and post-modern self-awareness. Once you recognize that, it's easy to see why he considers "Numb" and "What I've Done" to be songs that "hit hard." They hit hard because they are so nakedly about the painful emotions they are about. Free of lyrical complexity, free of instrumental complexity, free of structural complexity, they are unambiguous expressions of anxiety set to easy power chords and verse/chorus formula. I don't like those songs too much either, but the guy is clearly "for fucking real" and gave a fair bit of context to his perspective, which is more than most positive reviews have done so far. Instead, many of them simply through the songs one by one and say, "Yeah, this is a good one, Delson's pretty crazy on the guitar, et cetera and so on." Which are about as thoughtful as someone going through a grocery list and confirming everything they want is in their cart.
I'm all for Mike expressing those opinions, but it'd be nice to act on them and replace that fodder live with something else from here on out. I'd love to see literally any song in their catalog in lieu of WID and New Divide, just to name a few, next time I see them live. And before anybody jumps on me and says things like "there's no way they could do that! They gotta play what fans want! People who haven't seen them before!" Well, no. If LP TRULY were disgusted with those songs and felt that there was little artistic integrity in playing them or thinking about them, as Mike's quote implies, they don't have to play them. For instance, I've been to a RHCP show in 2006 where they didn't play "Under The Bridge" or "Otherside." Two of their absolute biggest hits. I've seen Tool twice, and neither time did they play "Sober." And Nirvana flat out refused to play "Smells Like Teen Spirit" at times during the In Utero tour I've heard.
Not a very important review but: http://blastoutyourstereo.com/reviews/album-reviews/linkin-park-the-hunting-party-album-review-10207
AllMusic has posted a full review, keeping the 3.5 star rating. That'll bump up the Metacritic score by a bit.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/...-up-notable-releases-jennifer-lopez/10633905/ 3 out of 4 stars review. Also, It's worth noting that Metacritic can sometimes be quite slow with adding reviews. I'm expecting the Metacritic total to be at least 70+ when it's all said and done.
It's kind of annoying when reviewers give low scores on purpose just to bring averages down. The way I see it, reviewers should try to be as objective as possible when first hearing new music. What I mean is that they shouldn't let past disappointments or criticisms affect their views on new music. It's just stupid that some professional reviewers still compare any new material LP releases to Hybrid Theory. Just treat each album as its own entity. It can't be that difficult, can it? Edit: I realize that objectivity in music is very difficult to achieve most of the time. People have always had different tastes in music which leads to the subjective nature of rating/critiquing music, no matter what it may be.
Rolling Stone gives it 2.5/5 http://www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/the-hunting-party-20140617 No substance here.
^What a shit review. I don't need reviews to be all positive, but my god, that was biased, ignorant bullshit. http://www.amazon.com/review/R3SCHD...glance&nodeID=5174&store=music#wasThisHelpful Not a professional review, but it gave me a damn good laugh.
I disagree. Art doesn't exist in a bubble. It exists in our world in a social and cultural context, and within the context of an artist's other works. I think it is important to keep all those things in mind to a degree.
I agree to a certain degree but it really depends on what kind of art you are dealing with. Some art stands stronger on its own autonomic premises. You don't have to look at everything in a social or historical perspective in order to appreciate it. It is always worth having in mind but I believe a reviewer's job is most importantly to judge what he is hearing.
After an electronica foray, the nu-metal pioneers bring back the noise in ballistic, riff-tastic punk tirades against war, injustice and sundry evils that justify this splendid ruckus. I rather like this description from USA Today. Dude called "Until It's Gone" better than A Thousand Suns.
I like how these people still have no idea what to make of "Living Things", so they just group it with "A Thousand Suns"
Rolling Stone was very positive towards Reanimation (3/5), Minutes to Midnight (4/5, their highest score), (somewhat) A Thousand Suns (3/5) and Living Things (3/5). Based on all the articles of RS I've read that mention LP, they like LP a lot. Shame they didn't like their new album.
I disagree. The majority of LIVING THINGS bears an electronic sound reminiscent of A Thousand Suns, and as such it is logical to group them together.