Always like the poppier side of LP so OML fits right in my book. Here hoping they go full symphonic in the next album. Give me some Le Fiction LP.
There is a good chance that in 6 months the "good but not great" people will move to "meh" and the "this album is excellent" people will just say it's good but not amazing. Just saying =p
My Top 10 1. Sorry For Now A+ 2. Halfway Right B+ 3. Invisible B + 4. Nobody Can Save Me B 5. One More Light B 6. Talking To Myself B 7. Battle Symphony B - 8. Good Goodbye C 9. Sharp Edges C 10. Heavy C-
Stuck at work so I can't listen. Damn. I see a lot of people are putting Heavy as their least favorite song on the album. Not a bad thing.
Having expressed my disdain for this album, I have to say that Talking To Myself is a killer track. Catchy as hell.
Overall, the album is not as bad as I feared, so at least I'm glad for that. One More Light sounds better live. Simpler and direct. Album version felt like it could build up to a beautiful orchestral chorus but never happened. Halfway Right is fun, sounds like some 80's musical tune. Talking to Myself feels like the strongest "LP" track of the album Nobody Can Save Me is pretty solid, better than Battle Symphony. Sorry For Now is alright, won't be my go-to track of the album Sharp Edges is not what I expected. Way less serious.
It's better than I thought... Best to worst for me: Talking to Myself Nobody Can Save Me One More Light Good Goodbye Sorry for Now Battle Symphony Halfway Right Invisible Sharp Edges Heavy Really good album
OMG I AM SO IN LOIVE WITH THIS NEW RECORD!!!!!!!! I was not expecting the variance in this album at all. Each Song holds it's own place in the record and wow the vocal performance with Chester and Mike feels so fresh and different. Sorry for now has got to be one of the best damn LP songs ever. NBCSM is Gold to me. halfway right and sharp edges I fucking love and OML is so sweet. as for everything else that's been released prior to the whole record I appreciate so much more. and Heavy grew on me so much I feel emotion every listen. Love this record. Love it .
Nobody Can Save Me - Has a very impactful and catchy chorus. I love how they incorporated a lot of different sounds all over the place, it just works. I really REALLY love the lyrics. I just wish they found a place for Mike to sing on this track too, it would have helped it feel more like Linkin Park, but it's all good. I wish it wouldn't have ended so abruptly, but that's probably something Ill get used to with more listens. Damn I love this one so much, gonna be repeating this one a lot for sure. 9/10 Good Goodbye - Makes me wish Mike rapped some more on this record, he totally kills it here. Pusha did good but Mike was just amazing. If they would have replaced the 2nd verse with another Mike verse and then ended it with Stormzy it would have been perfect, but thats just totally me. I've always loved the chorus to this one, feels like a sports anthem. 9/10 Talking To Myself - This is probably just going to me, but I am really not the biggest fan of this one. Even when I heard it live for the first time at that Warner Bros acoustic set, I just wasnt the biggest fan of its chorus. It's way too repetitive for my liking, it feels a bit lazy. After hearing it live with the full band, I mean, I thought it was cool and all but it just didn't resonate with me much. It's energetic and has a fun feel to it, but I just didnt connect to it emotionally I suppose. A lot of fans will love this one though because of its high energy and obvious guitar parts. I felt like this was the track that Chester meant when he said he "went at it", he has his moments on this one. 6/10 Battle Symphony - I was obsessed with this song when LP released it. It's one of the catchiest ones on the album. I love it's positive vibes and encouraging lyrics. Definitely one of my favorites off the album. F the haters, this song is bae. 10/10 Invisible - I just wish they didn't release this one before the album release date, it would have been best to keep this one a surprise until then. I think I read someone somewhere describing the synths having a "dreamy" feel and I totally agree with that. Mike sounds great here, goes to show how much he's really improved at singing. Even live, Mike sounded great. They should have experimented with the bridge a little bit more, maybe extend the instrumental or something. Besides that, 9/10 Heavy - Haha this song got so much hate its crazy. Even I admit I was totally "what the fuck" at first. I just dont agree that this one should have been the lead single. It fits nicely in the album, and if you listen to the album from start to finish you could agree that it just flows a lot better with the rest of the tracks. I just dont like how it feels like Kiiara leads too much on it and that it only features Chester. If it were Chester and Mike, then damn that would have been interesting and in my opinion would have made it a lot better. Even though I think it's alright, I understand why people wouldnt like it at all. Shouldnt have been a single at all honestly haha. 6/10 Sorry For Now - One of the best things LP has ever done. Holy shit. Mike and Chester sounded amazing. This song is so catchy and meaningful. I love the beat and the sounds, sounds like Linkin Park, but Linkin Park in 2017. Very modern but still felt like it was them. The Chester rap was so fucking cool haha. I even love he says "yeah!" before laying down his rap, it just put you in the mood to get into it. This should have been the lead single. 10/10 Halfway Right - I love the lyrics on this track. Verses sound awesome, it almost sounds like Chester raps the verses here too. I think the chorus is catchy but in comparison to some other stuff on this album it's just alright. I do think that this song is just a bit too generic sonically speaking. Nothing about it makes it stand out in particular. I like it, maybe just a little too forgettable. It could grow on me though. 6.5/10 One More Light - Wasn't as stripped as I thought it would be, I wish it was literally ONLY a guitar, piano and voice without all of those synths. It sounds so pure and genuine live and I wish they would have kept it that way. Honestly, I probably would have loved this track a lot more if I didn't hear the live version. Still an amazing track, this one has to grow on me, the live version gave me higher expectations. Not to mention Im a bit pissed that they only used Chester's falsetto of "I do" to serve as texture for the guitar solo. That shit sounds so good and impactful live they should have made it stand out in the bridge more. Still an emotional song though. 7.5/10 Sharp Edges - A fun track that encourages you to learn from your mistakes and trials. It ends the album on a high spirited tone. I like the way Chester sings on this one. This one could be a hit or a miss for many fans, as is the rest of the album obviously, but this folky fun style is something totally new. SE is truly the outlier on the album, not Good Goodbye imo. Its a good song, just kinda weird that it's coming from LP. 7.5/10 Overall: 8/10 Anyway thats what I think of the album as a whole more or less on first listen.
Sorry For Now could have been one of their best songs ever buut that fcking blackbear sounds made it worse
I've been a fan of this band for a long time. Hell, I've lurked on these forums for eleven years now. Going into the first three songs released during this cycle, I knew that this album wasn't going to be something I'd be replaying too often. And that didn't really bother me. Linkin Park's the first band I ever listened to, and arguably the catalyst for me taking on a creatively based career after college. I'll never lose the respect and love I have for them after what they've done for me. I honestly thought I'd just be passing on this album after taking a listen, but the track "One More Light" just hit me pretty hard. The entire album actually pleasantly surprised me - but at this point I'd have been fine with it being complete trash and it'd still have been worth it for that title track. Damn. I don't know. That song was beautiful.
Actually, Sorry For Now and Halfway Right are dope af holy shit. Edit: One More Light is as good, no, great, as I expected it to be.
My thoughts are pretty much the same as Bending's, with the exception of One More Light. I was actually quite underwhelmed by that track. Need to listen to this album more times, but as of right now I like it. It's pretty decent.
Damn. I could actually feel the emotion in Chester's voice on the title song. Especially during the end of the song. When he repeats the chorus, it sounds so powerful. "We're quicker, quicker" is said with such a passion. Almost in a rough and angry way. Like you are still in shock and denial. Then he goes sad again. I love these small details.
Just finished listening to it, and surprisingly enjoyed it more than I thought I would. Can't really make a judgment on all the songs after one listen but I love Talking to Myself! When I heard Linkin Park discussing One More Light last year this type of song was what I was expecting, it's sort of like a poppier MTM song, which I personally wanted this album to be. Definitely need to listen to Sorry for Now and Halfway Right again, those songs were definitely more different than I anticipated them to be, and I mean that in a good way! Overall after one listen I'd probably give this album a 7.5/10
Here's a perfect example of how two people can be fans of the same band(s) and still have vastly differing opinions. Take me, for example. I have been a fan of both Linkin Park and Paramore since before both bands had a hit single. I went into listening to both After Laughter and One More Light with an open mind. This wasn't too difficult for me as I am pretty open to all music. I love everything from the Backstreet Boys to Pantera and whatever falls in between. After Laughter, to me, seems forced. It's a good album, but it doesn't make me feel like it's their best work. Whereas I find OML to be completely refreshing. The only track that really took me some time to accept was Good Goodbye. If I'm going to grade them then After Laughter would get a C and OML would get a B-. The great thing about being a fan and consumer is that we have our say with our money. You can choose not to buy the album or you can choose to buy it and offer your thoughts and those thoughts aren't any less true than mine.