Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park has spoken about what the group have planned for the 20th anniversary of their iconic album Hybrid Theory in a new interview with Kerrang!
Speaking as part of a Kerrang! Face-To-Face video, the Linkin Park muso revealed that they’ve been working with a slew of key figures present throughout Linkin Park’s history to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Linkin Park’s debut studio album.
“We’ve done our best to go to a lot of people who are family, in a sense, and say, ‘What do you think we should do? What would be a good celebration of Hybrid Theory?’ and try our best to do a bunch of those ideas,” Shinoda said.
“I would urge the fanbase to just let it happen,” he continued. “The Linkin Park fanbase is always one of the most creative and active fanbases out there. So always, the problem for me is that if I’m not allowed to divulge information because I want it to be a surprise, then the creative fanbase starts jumping out and imagining things. They come up with their own great ideas – and then once in a while those great ideas are better than our ideas!”
Mike added that using Twitch streams to develop his Dropped Frames has created a welcome distraction from the current coronavirus pandemic.
“These releases [Dropped Frames] are not intended to be for everybody; these streams are not intended to be for everybody,” he said. “The joke in the chat is that they’re going to be on the Billboard 200. They’re not. That’s not what this is. I think we know that. It’s tough, when you’ve got something like Linkin Park on your resume, for that idea of commercial success to not enter the question.
“But to me, it really is about quality of connection and not quantity right now. I really am enjoying having a tight community on Twitch. If it grows and gets bigger, that’s fine – as long as it stays at the quality of communication and the tone of things.”
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Shinoda continued, “I feel like that’s what we need, because with social distancing and quarantining and whatever, our emotional and social needs as people has changed. I don’t even think we know how much they’ve changed, or what’s going on. But my gut says this is something that these fans and I are hungry for. I’m really pleased to have been able to stumble into it and for it to be happening.”
Check out ‘Nobody’s Listening’ by Linkin Park:
