1016. Linkin Park / Hybrid Theory. 2000. 3.5/5

Back in 2001 I was being driven home by one of my mates from having seen KISS in concert. As you do, you are reliving the night and listening to music at a thousand decibels in the car. This particular mate is very good at being up with the latest music trends, and he pulls out a CD and says, “Have you heard this album? It’s insane!” He throws it into his car’s CD player, and for the first time I hear what had become a particular obsession of his over recent months, Linkin Park’s debut album Hybrid Theory.

So from the very start I can admit that this isn’t my preferred style of metal. And even on that first night listening to the album, with my mate extolling its virtues constantly, I found myself pushing against it. Mind you, I had just seen KISS, so it’s a big change to go from KISS to Linkin Park. I recognised a couple of the songs, as they had begun to leak through to radio airplay even in Australia at that time, but I wasn’t jumping out of my skin about it. Over the coming weeks though, as I began to notice the radio singles each time they were played I felt more comfortable with the style, and eventually got a copy of the album to give it a fairer hearing.
The album switches between a heavier harder element and a softer less aggressive approach. Rapping through songs doesn’t do it for me in general. I find that as a rule for me it is like power metal ballads, for the most part I just can’t abide by it, but there are the odd occasions when I feels it works well. The same goes for sampling and other such effects. That stuff doesn’t fit in my picture of what metal is, but on occasions when it is done well I can get along with it. Pieces of this album are the best examples of that in regards to the rapping and sampling. The opening stanza of “Papercut”, which opens the album excellently, and followed by the heavier first single “One Step Closer” showcase the better parts of this. “With You” gives it a red hot go, and is enjoyable without being overly catchy.
“Points of Authority” has good moments, but honestly feels like it sits in the same gear musically for the whole three and a half minutes which is somewhat detrimental to its effect. The mournful aspect of “Crawling” no doubts serves its purpose both lyrically and musically, pushing that angst hard at you, but perhaps just wallows too much in it, much in the same way Andy Cairns from Therapy? made mistakes with their Infernal Love album. “Runaway” works better in this regard because at least it has a better tempo to break through that overloaded angst without losing the point of the lyrics. The industrial-styled mode of “By Myself” brings comparisons to Fear Factory in places, chugged along by various rap and scream combinations as well. Following this assorted box of songs we have the big single “In the End”, which is still just as catchy as it was when it was released. This is the best example of the rap/soaring vocals combination working at its best. All of the band’s elements pull together here in the one song to showcase exactly what they could do. Whether it is the album’s best song is open to question, but it is the one where those elements all blend together perfectly.
“A Place for My Head” and “Forgotten” is where the energy of the album centralises, the blazing beginning of “Forgotten” especially busting into the heaviest guitar from within, and makes for a pleasant interlude. “Cure for the Itch” seems like filler. “Pushing Me Away” has the basic elements to be a really strong and hard closing track, but in the end (no pun intended) it doesn’t quite fulfil the brief in this regard. I think it leaves far too much waiting to happen to finish the album on a huge note, and while I still like the song I just get the feeling the finish needed a bigger ending than it has.

I probably would have gotten around to reviewing this album for this site eventually, but it was pushed to the front of the queue this week with the passing of Chester Bennington. I brought this album out of storage for the first time in years, and was surprised to find how well it had held up in my estimation after all of these years. Perhaps it was just that as it was the forerunner of this kind of material that those that had come after this album and done their own versions of the standard only made me realise just how impressive this album actually was. It still isn’t my preferred style of metal, but the appreciation for the skills of the band is still there, and it is still remarkable how catchy some of the songs remain. It’s a pity that it took such tragic circumstances for me to come back to this and realise this in the first place.

Rating:  “In the end, it doesn’t even matter”.  3.5/5