From noisecreep.com:
It's been a long few days for Linkin Park vocalists Chester Bennington and Mike Shinoda. The band flew from Los Angeles to New York to do a frantic round of print, radio, Internet and TV promotion, play an intimate club show for Best Buy and attend the meet and greet after show party. Now they're getting ready to fly back home, where Shinoda will attend a friend's birthday party and Bennington will spend some time with his wife and kids before Linkin Park start rehearsing for their upcoming tour, which begins on Oct. 20 in Berlin, Germany.
From MTV.com
Those familiar with the "Saw" film franchise are fully aware that a large part of the popular series' appeal — in addition to its always-disturbing, gory action or trap sequences — is the veil of mystery that surrounds each film's individual plot. The films are not screened for critics, and it's difficult to get definitive details from any of the actors or filmmakers before the film opens.
Such is the case with the upcoming "Saw 3-D." So far, all we have to go on is , a cool-but-creepy and a painful-looking photo of Linkin Park's Chester Bennington reaching out from the broken windshield of a car.
When MTV News caught up with singer/actor Bennington recently, we tried to get him to divulge a few details about his mysterious role in the heavily hyped bloodfest.
"I can tell you that my name is Evan," Bennington offered. "Other than that, I can tell you nothing else about the character."
Gee, thanks, Chester. What about the scene you're involved in then?
"The thing that is interesting about this particular scene is that it's a trap set for multiple people," he explained. "Jigsaw, for those who know the films, Jigsaw typically sets up traps for one, maybe two people. There are never more people involved than that."
Until now, it seems.
"This particular trap is set up for multiple people, and it's a very complicated trap that's been set. There are different kinds of emotional things going on for my character, but it's very much in the tradition of a good 'Saw' trap," Bennington promised. "And it's in 3-D, so there's going to be blood spattering at your face, which is something that's going to be pretty bad-ass."
Check out everything we've got on "Saw 3-D."
For breaking news, celebrity columns, humor and more — updated around the clock — visit MTVMoviesBlog.com.
The other day I got a chance to record a station for IHeartRadio. It’s an online station where we (Chester and I) get to play whatever we want; we host the show ourselves. The best part was that I got really tired of just hearing myself talk, so I started messing around, calling people and bothering them, and even playing some rare Linkin Park tracks (and I think one Fort Minor one). It’s going to go up some time in October. (I asked some of you to send questions and stories via Twitter; thanks for your help making the show interesting.)
In the days between then and now, I’ve been rehearsing with those other five guys to put a show together. We leave for tour in four days. We’re hitting a few places in South America, A bunch of dates in Europe, and a bunch of dates in Australia (What’s up PERTH and ADELAIDE). Ready for a little bit of this:
Oh yeah, the title of this post was “rehearsals, my own radio station, and anteaters. Here you go:
Joe will be chatting with current LPU members on Friday, October 1 at 11:30AM PST. To join the chat, login to LPU, click on UNDERGROUND, then ENTER THE CHAT ROOM. Come prepared with good questions.
Note, chat time and date subject to change.
Hey guys. I’ve been getting some questions regaring my thoughts about the album release, so I thought that I’d try to address some of them.
To start, a quick review: about a year and a half ago, we made a conscious decision to take our music in a new direction. Once the music started flowing, it became a modern, alternative sound–an abstract, concept-driven, 50-minute journey. We predicted the album release would be incendiary; the new direction would be welcomed by some, and fervently resisted by others. Now, with that album out in stores, it seems that you guys are curious about our intentions behind the music, and our reactions to the noise being made about A Thousand Suns.
Let’s get the simple part out of the way. To the fans who like the new album: a million thanks for your support. There are some of you that have been with us for a long time, and are thrilled about the new sound; there are others who weren’t sure of the new album at first, but have given it a chance, and are now reaping its rewards. And there are others who have never been fans of Linkin Park, but are interested in the band for the first time with A Thousand Suns. We’re happy to have all of you on board, and we appreciate your good words and rave reviews.
A friend of mine told me a story from his childhood: when he was a little kid, his dad, who never had any facial hair, left for a trip and came home with a beard. His son took one look at him and ran away, demanding, “what happened to my real dad?”
So let’s talk about “haters.”
We’ll ignore the fact that there are people out there who would review and rate an album without really listening to it, who might preview some of the tracks and throw down an opinion (although I think the music stores and websites should keep the right to “rate it” limited strictly to those who have bought and listened to something). I don’t need to tell you that the internet can breed negativity-for-negativity’s-sake. So let’s skip that nonsense, and talk only about the people who were already Linkin Park fans, but listened to the new album and didn’t like it. As I write this, one of the most popular iTunes (US) reviews of A Thousand Suns is by Janxrod, who gives the album one star and asks “What happened to the real Linkin Park?” In response to this review, one knee-jerk reaction I found seems to be an assumption that people who dislike ATS simply love heavy metal and hate alternative / electronic music. But, in their defense, many of the “one-star reviewers” are not brainless cynics who talk shit because they’re bored.
I’m a curious guy, so I did some research about Janxrod. Although 7/10 of his favorite albums include stuff like Disturbed, Shinedown, and Dethklok…he also likes Daft Punk. He’s not opposed to a little variety. So what bothers Janxrod so much about A Thousand Suns? One reason is that, according to his page, we “write songs about how pissed off they are at their old fans, telling them to go f*** themselves. That’s not mature, that’s just disrespectful.”
Know what? I agree. That’s a bad message. The problem is: it’s not really our message.
Let’s clear it up: the other guys and I have said many things in the past, not all of it thoughtful or respectful (sorry, we’re human too). But let it be known that we love and respect our fans of all eras. And, just as we stand behind Hybrid Theory, we stand behind the work we put into A Thousand Suns, so we think it’ll be a rewarding listen if you decide to give it a chance (like Justin Lewis, Jeffrey Griffith, and James Montgomery did). And, in case Janxrod decides to give the album a chance, our door will always be open.
Some will always lazily claim that a band has “gone pop” or “sold out.” As far as I know, “selling out” means compromising the integrity of your band/music in exchange for money or popularity. Never before has this claim been so absurd. This is the opposite of a “sell out” album; don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. If money and popularity was the goal, the safe bet would be to try to make Hybrid Theory again. Outside our studio walls, the climate for music is different: according to Nielsen SoundScan, of the 97,751 albums released in 2009, only 12 of them sold more than one million units last year. Everyone in the world is buying music by the song, not by the album. So, more than ever before, to stand behind one whole 50-minute piece–asking the fan to listen to the whole thing rather than a couple songs–is unquestionably a big a request. (Some people want to color that request as a “marketing tactic,” that we are asking people to buy the whole thing instead of a couple songs. If that was the case, we’d be the worst marketers ever. Clearly, a collection of “hit singles” is a better reason to buy a whole album than a concept record.) Radio singles still sell an album. A concept album requires a leap of faith on the listener’s part. The whole “sell out” argument is wholly illogical.
So why did we make such a big change? “What happened to the real Linkin Park?” We’re still here. We look and sound different, but the intention behind the music is the same as it has been since day one: in the studio, we are constantly in search of new sounds that excite and inspire us.
Hearing that our album debuted at #1 in 15 countries gave us all a massive feeling of gratitude, but if being in this band has taught me anything in the past decade, it’s that you can’t base your happiness on things that are out of your control. The truth is, we’re believers that good, honest art will triumph at the end of the day. But the measure of real success isn’t sales, numbers, and chart position. It’s about a connection with a dedicated fan base and a chance to introduce people to a fresh new sound.
See you on tour, where we’ll be playing songs from “Hybrid Theory” through “A Thousand Suns.” Fans of every era are welcome.
From LPNewsletter. Go to LP.com or check your Mails for more Infos
To celebrate the release of A Thousand Suns, we've teamed up with Tapulous to release LINKIN PARK REVENGE. Watch the trailer HERE and download the game now.
Songs included included in the game:
-The Catalyst
-Waiting For The End
-Wretches And Kings
-Blackout
-New Divide
-What I've Done
-Bleed It Out
-Numb
-Faint
-One Step Closer
The first thing is you hear is screaming, followed by a harsh rush of percussive sounds, then finally a familiar vocal. Yes, Linkin Park is back, with new music, A Thousand Suns and a powerful new single, Catalyst, which is already #1 on the Billboard Rock Songs chart.
Watch the video on RadarOnline.com
EXCLUSIVE VIDEO BLOG: Tamar; Sinner Or A Saint?
The band (Shinoda, vocalist Chester Bennington, drummer Rob Bourdon, guitarist Brad Delson, DJ Joe Hahn and bassist Dave "Phoenix" Farrell) shared some exclusive behind-the-scenes of the making of the record with RadarOnline.
Dubbed “alternative rock” or “nu rock” after their hit debut album, Hybrid Theory in 2000, the band has an unusual sound to say the least, so it’s fascinating when they let us pull back the curtain, even for a few minutes.
EXCLUSIVE VIDEO BLOG: Jason Derulo At Teen Choice Awards
As the encore goes, God Save Us Everyone. And hold onto your seats when they play the VMA Awards September 12th.
A Thousand Suns drops Tuesday, September 14.
Linkin Park have teamed up with MySpace for TEN lucky winners to win 2 tickets to the New York Show, September 14th, which will be Linkin Park's first live show of the year. Read the details below to see how you can win tickets and a chance to record the event for MySpace below.
On September 14, Linkin Park will be playing at The Best Buy Theater (formerly known as the Nokia Theater) in NYC to celebrate the release of their new album, A Thousand Suns. This will be their only North American show of 2010. And we want you to be there to capture the band in all their glory. That’s right: We want to not only give you a pair of free tickets to the show, but also have you help us film it on site.
Don’t worry, we’re not going to make you lug around a gigantic camera. We’ll provide you a flip cam. But essentially, here is the deal. We’re calling on a thousand fans (get it, because the album is called A Thousand Suns) to tell us why they would like to help MySpace film the show.
We will then look over the submissions and whittle down to ten winners who will be given access to the show via two tickets.Sound good? Here is what we’ll need you to do to enter:
“According to legend, in August of 2000, a group of clearly terrified Capitol Records executives were outfitted with headphones, loaded into a series of unmarked vans and driven down the Pacific Coast Highway, where they listened to Radiohead’s Kid A for the first time. It was an inspired — not to mention particularly apt — premiere for the album, and though the whole thing is rather apocryphal, it certainly made for nice copy at the time.
I only mention that because in August of 2010, a clearly relaxed Warner Bros. publicist sat me down in her office and allowed me one of the first listens to Linkin Park’s A Thousand Suns. There were no headphones or unmarked vans or winding, windswept vistas — budgetary cuts, one can only assume — just an iced coffee and a notepad, which was sort of a shame, because if ever there was an album that deserves the Radiohead treatment, it’s this one. Since, as you’ll probably discover in the coming weeks, A Thousand Suns is most definitely Linkin Park’s Kid A…completely different from the band’s previous efforts that it will almost certainly stand as the line of demarcation between everything that came before and everything that will come after…”
A big thank you to James Montgomery for the flattering (and ballsy) piece. Read the whole article here: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1646930/20100831/linkin_park.jhtml
GQ: So besides that train story, what's the most ridiculous thing you've ever read about yourself?
Irina: I don't know. Sometimes I google my name a little bit. I once read that an article about one hundred models and what they do, and it said that I'm dating the singer from Linkin Park and that he's really lucky. I've never even met him.
Linkin Park just premiered their murky, mercurial video for "The Catalyst," and for the second consecutive week, the song is #1 on the Billboard rock songs chart, but so far, they've yet to perform the song live.
But on September 12, at the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards, that will change. Because Linkin Park have just been added to an ever-growing list of performers for the big show, and they'll be playing "The Catalyst," for the first time on television.
"After two years of working on our new album, we're looking forward to sharing our first live performance of new music with our fans around the world on the MTV Awards," Chester Bennington said in a statement about the show.
It's an appropriately big stage for the song, the first single off the band's much-anticipated new album, A Thousand Suns, which hits stores on September 14.
Other confirmed performers for the 2010 VMAs include Eminem, Kanye West, Justin Bieber, Paramore, Drake, B.o.B, Usher and Florence and the Machine. Travie McCoy, Jason Derülo and Robyn will also join VMA house artist deadmau5 for a series of intimate performances.
Confirmed presenters for the show include Justin Timberlake, Ke$ha, Nicki Minaj and Trey Songz. More performers and presenters will be announced in the coming days. Comedian Chelsea Handler will host.
The 27th annual MTV Video Music Awards will be broadcast live from the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles on September 12 at 9 p.m. ET. Go to VMA.MTV.com (or text VMA to 97979 if they are Verizon subscribers) to vote for the Best New Artist video through September 12.
"We’re getting together to spend some time with the band at a very intimate venue. They’ll be answering your questions and performing live. It’s not possible to get any closer to the band without actually joining them on stage. This is a Linkin Park fan’s dream come true.
You’ve got two ways to get in. Listen to The Kevin & Bean Show all week. They’ll tell you when to call. When they do, dial 800-520-1067 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 800-520-1067 end_of_the_skype_highlighting. An alternate way to get in is via the KROQ Street Team. If you’re not a member, now is the time to sign up!"
"This is the most intimate show you'll ever see with this band. It's a once-in-a-lifetime performance."
Sign up for the KROQ Street Team here.
So all you have to do is listen in all week to see when they plug the contest and ask you to call, and you could win two passes for this special event.
In tomorrow's edition of Kerrang! Magazine, Linkin Park will be the main feature with an exlcusive interview.
The rebirth of Linkin Park!
Over three years since the release of their last album, Linkin Park are returning with something new, something different and something fun. With their past finally behind them, in this week's Kerrang! magazine, we bring you Linkin Park as you've never heard them before..."
From Mikeshinoda.com
Phoenix and I just landed in London today, and got an email with some great bits of Linkin Park news for you guys…check this out:
- Went from four million in April 2010 to ELEVEN million today
- First #1 debut in history of Billboard Rock Songs chart
- #1 at Modern Rock radio
- #1 Most Added at Alternative, Active Rock, and Mainstream Rock Radio (upon release)
Linkin Park – The Catalyst / Medal Of Honor video:
- #1 most viewed video on all of Youtube, worldwide, upon release
…Thanks to everyone for supporting the new song and album. A Thousand Suns is coming soon…
As anyone who follows the band knows, we usually have a LOT of stuff going on. The tough part for us is finding a simpler way to keep you guys up-to-date. We’re trying out a new solution: the new Linkin Park App, for iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and Android.
The app is FREE. It has all the obvious stuff, like news and tour dates, but also plays all our LPTV episodes and videos, finds other LP fans in your area (if you want), and collects all Linkin Park online activity, all in one place. You can connect it to your Facebook and Twitter accounts, so you can respond to a blog post or video without opening and closing a bunch of windows. You can also shoot photos at the concert, and immediately upload them online using the app…and it ranks users based on activity, so if you’re active on our sites, you’ll get recognized.
It currently supports English, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Dutch, and Turkish. More to come.
For iTunes: http://awe.sm/595m7
For Android: http://awe.sm/595mD
Also, for those of you who have already downloaded the app, I just created a thread on the message board to discuss ways to make it better: http://www.linkinpark.com/forum/topics/new-linkin-park-app
Thanks!
From MikeShinoda.com
For an upcoming promotion with iTunes, I need to come up with a list. 15 albums, tied together by a theme. Which of the following themes seems the most interesting to you guys? Vote, and I’ll make that list, to put up on iTunes.
Go here to Vote
According to the german radiostation 1Live Linkin Park think about playing “A Thousand Suns” in it’s entirety when they’ll start touring. It’s not set yet, but they’re thinking about. The news (german) can be checked HERE.
From kara.allthingsd.com
It’s nice to hear enthusiasm on the part of Linkin Park band member Mike Shinoda about an innovative-for-the-music-industry effort to give fans a chance to be part of the iconic Grammy-winning rock band.
That’s because most artists or content creators–while making all the right sounds about the Internet’s impact on their business–often privately cringe at the ongoing flood of user-generated material that has drastically changed the industry.
Not Shinoda, who is certain he will find some real talent via a new online contest, called “Linkin Park, Featuring You,” that gives anyone an opportunity to collaborate with the band to produce an original song based on some of the tracks from the forthcoming single “The Catalyst.”
The song is on Linkin Park’s next album, “A Thousand Suns,” to be released September 14.
“We looked at it as both risky and fun to save a spot on the record that could be just anything,” he said in an interview with BoomTown earlier this week. “It’s creative, lets the fans be heard and, of course, is a great way to promote the album.”
Of course it is, but Shinoda said he is not expecting to have to put any bad-quality music on the record just to sell more music.
“The album could not be any more sacred to us and this is certainly an X-factor, which is kind of a move against the grain for us,” he said. “But the Internet has actually given a lot more people a chance to be heard and, as it has turned out, amateurs are so much better than we ever expected.”
So far, Shinoda said, he has just sampled a few dozen of the thousands of submissions so far, either selecting randomly or via a popularity ranking system the contest uses. He said he’s also using a range of people who are part of the Linkin Park team to filter material.
But, ultimately, Shinoda and his bandmates (pictured here) will pick the winning submission, with either the song to be included on the band’s new album or the winner to be invited to perform with the band on a song on the upcoming record. Either way, a pretty good prize for an aspiring musician.
Shinoda said he is hoping to hear a lot of different sounds from electronic music to keyboards to guitars and even horns (“No one has submitted a horn version so far,” he laughed. “But I hope someone does.”)
Linkin Park is using a group of Internet companies to carry out the massive user-generated effort, including: MySpace Music (platform, promotion and direct fan messaging); Indaba Music (hosting the MySpace application that allows musicians to auto-syndicate their remixes on MySpace); Top Spin Media (using their email for a song widget to deliver audio stems to all participants); and Ning (the back end to Linkin Park’s Web site, where they are also distributing the audio stems to push back to the contest)
There have been remix contests online done before, such as Snoop Dogg’s “That Tree” Remix Contest, which had 8,000 entries and generated a lot of fan interest.
But this effort is clearly more ambitious, perhaps because Shinoda is clearly a techie, with an ongoing interest in filling the Linkin Park Web site with puzzles, games and other interactive features.
In fact, Linkin Park had already conducted a smaller contest for fans to submit designs for characters used in a game the band released in April, called “8-Bit Rebellion,” for the Apple (AAPL) iPod touch, iPhone and iPad. And, after the game was completed by a player, it unlocked a new song, “Blackbirds.”
Shinoda said the band hopes to do even more digitally, trying to involve and engage fans in ways that they never would have tried before.
“There is a huge unknown factor and this is not something we would have done five years ago,’ he said of the latest collaboration contest. “But I am not afraid of my fans being good at music, even if it turns out they are better than me.”
Until a winner is selected, here’s a most excellent music video of my favorite Linkin Park song, “Shadow of the Day,” because I wish I had written the perfect and simple line, “Sometimes beginnings aren’t so simple/Sometimes goodbye’s the only way” (maybe some fan will write something as good)
read more here
