I think Blackbirds has the best lyrics LP has ever written. Nice slow song that I come back to every now and then along with most LPU songs, Not Alone, and New Divide.
I really liked the song when I first found it, but I can't even remember the last time I've had the desire to listen to it. I like the way Mike's rap comes in, and the way Chester sounds slightly more aggressive throughout the song. Maybe I would think otherwise if it had actually been included on MTM, but it sounds like it's missing something to me.
I gave Blackbirds several more listens yesterday. I like the raps mainly, as well as the bass, piano, and drums. Not really a fan of Chester's lyrics, and the guitar is just okay for me. I really like the instrumentation on Mike's second rap. It still sounds as if it could have something else in it to make it a "wow" kind of song. *still waiting for When They Come for Me and Blackout so I can rant*
Wow surprised how many people love Blackbirds. I personally just think it's a decent song. The lyrically themes on the song feels kind of redundant from LP but then again I do like some of the imagery in the song. It gives the song a dark and hopeless feeling: "I shiver and shake the warm air cold" "I sweat through the sheet as daylight fades" "Lay the sick ones down and the bells will ring Put pennies on the eyes let the dead men sing" The rap verse is very uncalled for and is kind of a nice surprise in the song.
The intro is only in the fanmade album 'Unwanted Truth'. I have the version without the weird rap intro.
The intro is in the version that's on the deluxe edition of A Thousand Suns on iTunes. Last time I checked, A Thousand Suns wasn't a fan-made album (inb4 everyone takes the opportunity to use that statement to bash ATS). I'm pretty sure your version of the song is the unofficial one lol. Just to be clear, we are talking about the "Drop that, get up, take to the streets" verse right?
While I wait for ATS to begin, I'll kill time by imitating the intro to the album. Feel free to join. Oooooohhhhh... OOOOooohhh... OOOOOOOooooooohhhh... OOoooooooh....
Wait no longer. A Thousand Suns begins with "The Requiem". Clocking in at about two minutes in lenght, "The Requiem" is the bone-chilling opener of Linkin Park's [arguably] most ambitious album to date, A Thousand Suns. The song is built around layered, atmospheric synths and pads that the band used through the album. It's lyrics are taken from the agressive lead single "The Catalyst", which we'll discuss in a few weeks. It was first believed that a female voice was singing the song, however the song is sung by Mike Shinoda, with a lot of auto-tune and pitch-shifting effects. The song perfectly segues into "The Radiance", and is in many fans opinions the best Linkin Park album opener to date. A bit after the albums release, Mike had an interview with examiner.com in which he spoke on "The Requiem" and how the band achieved the sound of the song: According to my bit of research, the pad used for the song should be the Roland Juno-106. This song, sound wise, isn't as easy to explain as, for example, "Bleed It Out". Through the song, more and more synths appear, each following their own line. Some of these synths are later on heard in "The Radiance" and other songs on the album. The track's main melody comes from the light, piano-like synth which is repeated through most of the song. It takes a bit less than a minute for "The Requiem" to get to the vocals. It begins with an almost gregorian-like chant, repeated for about 20 seconds before Mike starts singing. As I mentioned before, the lyrics were taken from "The Catalyst". The verse from the song is repeated twice. The band originally came up with the lyric "let them burn inside the fires of a thousand suns", and after they looked it up, they found various references to the words "a thousand suns", and were intrigued by the quotes from the famous Robert J. Oppenheimer. When it came to choosing the album title, it was a no-brainer. The lyrics were later changed to "will we burn inside the fires of a thousand suns?", and this is where the epic chant in "The Catalyst" comes from. "The Requiem", a sonic experiment, also give home to the lyrics, as the band wanted A Thousand Suns to be somewhat conceptual, both in lyrics and in music. I think it's safe to say they did it. The song had it's live debut on the day of A Thousand Suns' US release date - September 14, 2010 during the 3-date album promo tour, in New York. It was followed up by "The Radiance", but more information on that can be found below. Through the years, it was followed by a number of songs. In the version I embedded above, recorded in July 2011 during the band's performance in London for the iTunes festival, it was followed up by Papercut. Through 2010 and 2011, it was the regular show opener, just like it's the opener of the album. It was performed in it's original, album form. The last known performance of the song in this form was at the very end of the A Thousand Suns touring cycle, on September 23, 2011. The song was retired during the Living Things era. In 2014, something unexpected happened. Right from the European tour, the band started to play a whole new live intro, composing out of elements from a lot of songs. It opened almost all shows in 2014, mashed up with "Session", "1 Stp Klosr", "The Summoning", "The Catalyst" and "Guilty All The Same". The song leads into the performance of the bands brand new, fierce lead single "Guilty All The Same". What do you think of "The Requiem" live experience? Following "The Requiem" is "The Radiance", the second track on A Thousand Suns. It seagues in directly from the previous track, and consits of a speech given by the famous Robert J. Oppenheimer laid on top of a fast, glitchy, agressive instrumental. Some quick history here, Robert J. Oppenheimer is one of the people who were heavily involved with Project Manhattan, and is often called "the father of the atomic bomb." The speech the band sampled in the song comes from Oppenheimer's speech which is usually referred to as the "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds" speech. The title comes from the final words of the speech, in which he refers to what thoughts the atomic bomb brought to mind. You can view a video of him giving the speech here. This video was used in a lot of the bands performances through the A Thousand Suns era. The introductionary speech found in the A Thousand Suns booklet says: "Oppenheimer's words resonate today not only for their historical significance, but for their emotional gravity." His speech says: The speech makes numerous references to the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is one of the three supreme deities in Hinduism. His speech revolves around the aftermath of the test or the actual dropping of the atomic bomb. After "Little Boy" detonated over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, the world was truly never the same. Oppenheimer's quote of Vishnu perfectly describe his feelings at the moment of the explosions. A Thousand Suns was first announced as a "delicious concept album" by Chester in November 2008, something he later on regretted saying. The band wanted to finally completely escape from the nu-metal box their first two albums created, and in 2009 they realized that a concept album would box themselves in once again, only this time they would have to write about only one thing. The final product, while more conceptual than any other Linkin Park album, is very abstract, and tells multiple stories. However, it's pretty clear that the two introductionary tracks, "The Requiem" and "The Radiance" are about the Pandora's box that human kind opened with nuclear warfare. This is a recurring topic on A Thousand Suns afterwards. (I realize I post a lot of videos from this show, and trust me... there's a reason. The band rarely kicks that much ass in one night.) "The Radiance" has only been performed in it's original album form once. This happened at the same show I previously talked about for "The Requiem", on September 14, 2010 during a promotional show for A Thousand Suns. The song was retired from live shows since the Living Things era. The first version is the instrumental-only version with the Mario Savio speech which is taken from "Wretches and Kings". As the band opened most shows with "The Requiem" and "The Radiance" followed by "Wretches and Kings", this version was created with the purpose of connecting the first and the last song. The second version, popularly called the "Live Version" mostly happened after "Numb" and served as a lead in to "Breaking The Habit". The video I embedded above uses this version. It laid Oppenheimer's speech on top of a piano line similar to the one used in "Numb", and contained Mike singing portions of lyrics from "The Catalyst" with auto-tuned and pitch-shifted vocals similar to the ones found on "The Requem". This live version also used a glitchy, Joe Hahn version of the speech which was played in sync with the video. A truly beautiful experience in my opinion, and I'm saddened by the fact Mike's portion isn't featured on the album. It's so silently psychotic, just what I like. There. We're beginning A Thousand Suns on time. Kinda.
To add to the sounds used in The Requiem, the piano note that leads into the vocals is the same note used in Waiting for the End, albeit differing in rhythm.
I really love that The Requiem is an amalgamation of samples from each subsequent track of the album. It sets the mood and presents the theme that follows until what can be thought of as the encore of the album. Each song is part of The Requiem, yet The Requiem is not part of every song. There's this beautiful unity that elapses the melody that shows through in the corrosiveness of Mike Shinoda's vocals and lyrics. It's the best opener of any LP album to date and probably to come.
Finally the day comes, the day we are talking about A Thousand Suns. The Requiem: Lets be honest. I was 15 when i bought ATS (yeah the deluxe version) and i was shocked (Not negative) when i listened to the start of the Album, it was different from all the other stuff i listened to this date. Nowdays i would say, The Requiem is a great opener for my favorite album to this date. Its dark and mysterical at the same time and it give me everytime chills, especially when the vocals start. Great opener to a great album (which i will talk about later). 2010 as the opener for the show in Dortmund it was so amazing, the bass in the song was incredible and the atmosphere just amazing. For the show on the second last Sunday in Oberhausen, it was different, the mash up was cool thought but honestly i prefered the "original" one, but for the bridge to GATS maybe the mash up was a better idea. Back to 2010 the bridge to W&K was brilliant. The Radiance: For me this "interlude" into Burning In The Skies is a harbinger for the following happenings in the album. It interludes into the "silence before the storm" for me and shows , that the silence dont last forever and that something will happen. 2010 in Dortmund , it was great after Numb and before Breaking the Habit (it was in my opinion a perfect bridge, love how BTH starts with the end of The Radiance) while Mike played the piano. It gaves me goose bumps. Just amazing. The interludes shows nearly the atmosphere in which ATS will continue and its a really good way to start the album. Hope they will do something like this sometime again.
"The Requiem" and "The Radiance" begins the experience of 'A Thousand Suns' in its best way. "The Requiem" is dark and moody and have a great atmosphere for the song. Same goes to "The Radiance" but the speech of Oppenheimer makes the song more special. I can say that both the songs are great and perfect to begin the experience of 'A Thousand Suns'.
It should also be mentioned that, when "The Requiem" was played live during the "A Thousand Suns" run, Shinoda sang that lead vox live from backstage. I don't know if the harmony is live as well, but probably not. Astat says also that Shinoda sang over a pre-recorded part too so he's doubling himself
Yes, ATS. YES. The Requiem - At first listen, this song was boring like the other shorter tracks and I wanted to skip it. But now, it's as if this song can perfectly lead into any song by Linkin Park I wanna listen to. From the Waiting for the End, Jornada del Muerto, and Blackout (which I picked up on my second listen to the album, and started me on my journey to it being my favorite album), to the lyrics taken from The Catalyst, this song is the perfect opener to A Thousand Suns. The ominous and foreboding lyrics open up the theme of the album, the same lyrics later to be revisited in the penultimate track of the album. I really have no way to describe how amazing of an opener this song is. It minimizes Wake to nothingness in the shadow of its amazingness. The Radiance - There's not much to say about The Radiance. Oppenheimer has some of my favorite quotes, among them the "the entire world is going to hell" quote, but I digress. There isn't very much unique about this track on its own, but when put in the full 45-minute experience of A Thousand Suns, it is the perfect bridge between the album opener and Burning in the Skies. The sound effect or whatever it is right before the line "I suppose we all thought that, one way or another" sounds like some sort of electrically-manipulated explosion, at least that's what I believe it is, and it fits perfectly with the theme of the speech. One does not simply listen to Burning in the Skies without The Radiance. I never do. I still think that the London version is leagues better than the album version though.