WHAT A TEMPER!: Linkin Park

Saturday, September 1, 2012

LINKIN PARK

The third and final act on this warm summer evening on August 30, 2012 here at the Comfort Dental Amphitheatre in Englewood CO was Linkin Park, the alt-rock/nu metal/rap metal band from California. They were what most people were waiting for based on the crowds response to their presence on stage, a large proportion of the audience singing along, word for word.

Linkin Park's tack, by comparison, was a punch in the gut to anyone still lathered up from Incubus. Theirs was a rock set with a capital R. When those guys came out, surrounded by drum risers and catwalk-type ramps, the fist pumping began and "Faint," with its familiar line, "I won't be ignored" came blasting through the amps. This is some of the most nihilistic pop music around. It's the soundtrack you hear in a war film, when Humvees go barreling into some desolate desert landscape. It's full-on and breathless, and, no, it won't be ignored.

Singer Chester Bennington and rapper Mike Shinoda co-front the group, blending rap and elements of slowed down metal. Their set, like Incubus's, was flawlessly executed. They played "Papercut," "Given Up," "With You" and "Somewhere I Belong" with the vigor of a gym rat on go-go juice. The word "dynamics" was not in the band's vocabulary last night. Linkin Park played new song "Victimized," another nihilistic jam. Strange how a band that has sold more than 50 million albums worldwide and are millionaires many times over could still be so pissed off.

Meanwhile, the adrenaline-crazed hits kept blasting out the speakers. "The Catalyst" was followed by "One Step Closer," during which giant flames shot up from the stage. Ten rows back, the heat was still intense. The show wound down, and Linkin Park reemerged for the obligatory encore, playing "Burn it Down" and a couple more tunes before wrapping it up for the evening.

Read it here:
http://blogs.westword.com/backbeat/2012/08/review_linkin_park_incubus_denver.php

Download it here
https://rapidshare.com/#!download|630p9|1691467528|LP%20ECO%20CDA%2020120830.rar|214461|0|0

Saturday, May 16, 2009

CRANK IT UP!

Hit the end of the work week and it was time to listen to some music. It was a cloudy evening, damp from a light rain coming down. That's been the pattern this last month or longer: beautiful weekdays followed by wet, cloudy weekends. The next weekend is shaping up to be the same.

I was planning on listening to some Green day in celebration of the fact I received my tickets to there August 15th show here in Denver, but the one show I had downloaded had already been listened to. So I switched to another favorite, Linkin Park dropping their January 1, 2007 soundbaord recording from the live at "Le Galaxy"Amneville, France show. Like I said "soundboard", meaning excellent quality. High energy rock cranked up to what my poor ears could tolerate. I rocked out under the roof overhang just outside the front door, occasionally stepping into the drizzle to feel the freshness of the rain on my face.

Gentle rain falling

Scent of cedar in night air

Wet flagstone glistens

Young voices straining
Power measured by volume
Locked in their strong grip

Turn up the volume
Their loud sound corrupts the soul
Blowout the eardrums

Lives in the moment

Captures all within his reach

All lost in the end

Download it here:

http://rapidshare.com/files/95295997/2008-01-17_-_Amneville__France_-_part01-02.rar

http://rapidshare.com/files/95298217/2008-01-17_-_Amneville__France_-_part02-02.rar

The warm up act was followed by Echo & The Bunnymen, having chosen to listen to their third studio album, Porcupine, released on February 4, 1983.

From Wikipedia:

Following the release of Heaven Up Here in 1981, Echo & the Bunnymen had difficulty writing new material for their next album despite rehearsing five days each week at The Ministry, their rehearsal room in Liverpool. While lead singer Ian McCulloch still wanted them to be the best band in the world, bass player Les Pattinson was expressing his weariness with the music industry, drummer Peter de Freitas produced and played drums on Liverpool band The Wild Swans' debut single "Revolutionary Spirit", and lead guitarist Will Sergeant recorded a solo album of instrumental music called Themes for 'Grind' (1982).

Recording the album was a slow process, de Freitas said, "Porcupine was very hard to actually write and record [...] Heaven Up Here was pure confidence, we did it really quickly; we had a great time doing it – but this one was like we had to drag it out of ourselves." McCulloch later said that when recording the album, the mood between the band members was "horrible".

Chris Adams in his Turquoise Days book says:

Although it ascended to #2 in the UK charts, it was savaged by the majority of critics for being self-indulgent, overly doomy, lyrically incomprehensible, and, overall, unbearably difficult listening.

Porcupine is probably...the most Bunnymen, way beyond Crocodiles and Heaven Up Here. But it was horrible to make and nasty to listen to. - Ian McCulloch, 1999.

Voice so alluring