Linkin Park - Minutes To Midnight

Genre rock Publisher Warner Bros. Records External Links Official Linkin Park Website Official Warner Bros. Records Website

Eerie digitally generated tones fill my headphones as a rising wall of noise hits me full on. Thus begins Minutes To Midnight, the latest from Grammy-winning rock group Linkin Park. The album kicks off with the hard rocking "Given Up" the band hails as a "coming out for Chester," as it's the first of the bands catalog to contain profanity. The band seems excited that this album bears a "Parental Advisory Sticker"; to them it seems to be some form of street cred. Does this new-found adulthood bring with it musical maturity?

From the radio single, we knew we were in for something different with this album. All but gone are the trademark rap-rock vocals of MC Mike Shinoda (Fort Minor), with vocalist Bennington filling the majority of vocal duties, while Shinoda shares production duties with legendary rock producer Rick Rubin. The announcement of Rubin's being tapped to work on the album instantly started a groundswell of theories and ideas as to the expected sound of the album, and which direction he hoped to take the band.

The lyrics are heavier on this album that's no doubt, the band isn't trying to be clean - or radio friendly, nor do they limit themselves to any particular sound, adventuring throughout with heavier rock, and very light almost-pop music, and crafting some really innovative beats such as "Bleed it Out" a guitar track backed by hand claps, random shouts and other effects. The album freely mixes sounds, not bothering with coherency or flow, to mixed effect. Shinoda explained that Minutes to Midnight "is composed of sounds made by a practically Arcade Fire-esque array of instruments including banjos, marimbas and vintage guitars and amps," and that's blatantly obvious.

Some of the new sounds will no doubt take some getting used to - and will no doubt set scene detractors off on the "Linkin Park's sold out" trip that inevitably follows any alternative band's departure from their traditional sound (please see Green Day for details), though we really hope that Shinoda or Bennington don't find themselves jumped in any LA nightclubs.

On the brief moments when Shinoda does rap, it's pretty much all him, and it's glorious. Clearly his work under the Fort Minor moniker refined his rapping skills, and you can hear the echoes of that work here, notably on "Hands Held High" where Shinoda raps over a digital beat with "amens" in the background. He also waxes poetic about war, poverty and drugs on the track, going back to themes found on the critically acclaimed Fort Minor.

Individually and collectively the band are 100 percent on point here, doing what they set out to do on their own merits, however as an album, its certainly hard to digest, with some of the transitions jarring to say the least. "People have always tried to lump us in with the whole rap/rock stereotype, but we don't intentionally want to be part of that scene. We've always had our own personality," Shinoda says. And this album - if nothing else - does just that. The album is innovative and undeniably light years ahead of the band's previous work. The band's messages more diverse, their sound richer and they are clearly being more adventurous then much of alternative rock out now.

Rather than fulfilling its promise solidly this album seems to fade out. Whether this was intentional is unclear, but the album feels like it comes up short — failing to deliver as it closes, getting lighter and lighter. Not to say it's bad material, as lyrically, vocally and musically the last few tracks are excellent — on par with the best of the album but in such a different way. You keep expecting them to bust out the amps, and they simply don't. Instead, they stick with digital beats and acoustics, ending the album with 3 darkly haunting tracks, "In Between" "In Pieces" and the slightly heavier but still incredibly powerful "Little Things Give You Away".

This album left me with something as a critic I've very rarely felt — on its own merits. I love this album, it's rich, brilliant and just amazing. However as a Linkin Park album, I can't avoid feeling just a little disappointed. I'm sure this new sound will grow on me, as many favorite band's evolutions have.

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