baconbash

Hybrid Theory - by Linkin Park
(Warner Bros. Records, 2000)

After releasing two demo tapes and struggling to land themselves a record deal, Linkin Park finally signed a deal with Warner Bros. Records in 1999. Next year, they burst into the nu metal scene with their debut album, Hybrid Theory, which would go on to sell 27 million copies worldwide, more than any other debut album in the 21st century.

Hybrid Theory is one of the most solid debuts I have ever listened to, containing hard rock masterpieces such as the lead single "One Step Closer" and "Crawling", but also excellent rap metal tracks like "Papercut" and "Points of Authority". Singers Chester Bennington and Mike Shinoda's voices work in harmony throughout the whole album, with Bennington singing the rock/metal parts, and Shinoda covering the rap portions.

On "Points of Authority", we can see the teamwork of Bennington and Shinoda better perhaps than anywhere else on the album, with Bennington singing most of the song, but Shinoda swinging in for multiple rap pieces, without ever feeling like an interruption to the song.

"One Step Closer" is a straight-up hard rock/metal song, relying on Bennington's loud and powerful voice to drive the song.

On song "In the End", a fan favorite 15 years later, Linkin Park even brings some beautiful piano to the album, a nice addition to the album as a whole and this power ballad.

"Forgotten" is a song buried into the last few tracks of the album, but is not one to be overlooked or forgotten, with decently fast rhymes by Shinoda in the verses, and Bennington and Shinoda swapping back and forth rapidly during the chorus.

The best guitar moment of the album is definitely "A Place for My Head", with an addictive guitar riff creating an excellent intro continuing throughout most of the song.

The weakest point of the album is "Cure for the Itch", a fortunately short song (at 2:37). "Cure for the Itch" is a session for Linkin Park's turntablist, Joe Hahn, who runs through a few samples after we listen to people sniffle, cough, and some cat meows. This is the only track on the album I feel could really have been left off without missing something.

Conclusion:
Hybrid Theory, despite some minor imperfections, is a glorious debut album, and excellent album period, which has well earned it sales and fans.

Rating:
9.5/10

Track Listing:

1. "Papercut"
2. "One Step Closer"
3. "With You"
4. "Points of Authority"
5. "Crawling"
6. "Runaway"
7. "By Myself"
8. "In the End"
9. "A Place for My Head"
10. "Forgotten"
11. "Cure for the Itch"
12. "Pushing Me Away"

Wpnfire

Inb4 someone says it sucks.

I prefer Meteora over it everyday, but it's still one of the most legendary albums of my time. I could talk about it all day.

Their method only works half the time, and the album is far from perfect and IMO, it set LP up for being in the talk of a "singles-only" band, but most of it is extremely, extremely catchy. Unlike most Linkin park fans, I am aware that Chester's voice isn't the most attractive, but the instrumentation, in particular the riffs and chord progressions, are ****ing brilliant, and Chester's voice, whether he's singing or screaming, is somehow always in tune with the melody, and his voice alone controls the mood of the song. It's powerful. Shinoa is the epitome of the stock, mainstream rap cadence, but his timing is absolutely glorious. His individual skill is low, but his production skills are godly. "Cure for the itch" was a strange track indeed, though I'm a lover of Daft Punk so it dun really bother me that much.

The songwriting is glorious, even if, again, some of the songs simply don't work well as others, but I don't appreciate the nu metal influences in some of the lyrics. Lines that consist of "shut up" shouted repeatedly are a total turn off for me.

Also, I'm very interested in keeping LP free of the "nu metal" labels. They are a heavily experimental alternative/metal band that dabbles heavily in metalcore and sometimes rap core.

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Key

Hybrid Theory and Meteora are two of Linkin Park's best albums, and will forever be a part of my "getting into rock" phase when I was younger. They definitely knew what they were doing back then, but unfortunately through the years they've sort of lose their way. Hybrid Theory is a great album though, but as Wpnfire said, I prefer Meteora.

Cuthbert

Never listened to Meteora. I've heard this and the album they made with Jay-Z.

Was a big fan of this album as a child but I downloaded it a while back for the bants and had to turn it off. It was good at the time but not now.

baconbash

Meteora was great as well, but for the most part it is like Hybrid Theory, so if you are no longer all that fond of this album, Meteora probably wouldn't be that enjoyable either. On their mash up album with Jay-Z, a few of the songs that were mixed were from Meteora.

It's good to see some responses from you guys, this is my first album review

Goofle

Not sure how much I would like it now, but it was my absolute favourite thing in the world when it first came out.

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Key

I listened to it again this morning on my way to work and I gotta say, it sounded ****ing amazing.

Goofle

Yeah I reckon I would still like it. Forgotten was my jam.

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Key

I listened to Meteora as well the same morning and that one is still so ****ing good.

CoNtrivedNiHilism

I still put Hybrid Theory on time to time as background music at my place and can still enjoy a lot. Always get really in to it once A Place for My Head comes on; strongest song on the album in my opinion, but there's really no bad song on Hybrid Theory, Joe's little moment isn't a negative in my opinion either.

People are usually too busy maintaining their spot on the hate train in regard to this band, which has more positives than negatives going for them. 27 million records is hard to argue with for a debut album, it's impressive. For its time, I agree that Hybrid Theory was a pretty solid album when it came out and was better than countless other mainstream releases by other bigger, and arguably better bands at the time.

There's an impressive attention to detail on Hybrid Theory. What sounds simplistic is in my opinion six people that know the importance of a good balance in music. Tell me that the attention to rhythm or melody on Hybrid Theory isn't impressive. It sounds pretty damn good and I've witnessed plenty of so called haters nodding their head to a band they claim has nothing good to offer.

I'm not as in to Linkin Park as I was in middle school, through highschool. But I'm not going to be made to feel ashamed or that my taste in music is ****ty because someone else can't stand this band.

Get off it already haha.

Oh. Meteora wasn't overly great in my opinion. There was some growth showcased in the songwriting. But overall there weren't huge strides forward in song arrangement or just instrumentation in general. I'd take Minutes To Midnight over Meteora any day, and Minutes To Midnight was still disappointing.

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