Mike Shinoda recalls being given some outlandish advice when Linkin Park were on the verge of exploding onto the rock scene back in 2000.
With the band’s record label doing everything they could to help get their careers off to a good start, Linkin Park were connected with a choreographer who had some ideas that can be kindly described as interesting.
Shinoda tells Complex: “On the funny side, there was the one time an A&R guy, because we were still getting comfortable onstage and working out that part of things, had us meet with this guy who choreographed and helped stage stuff on rap and R&B shows.
“This dude comes in and he’s basically like a choreographer and he literally suggested, ‘You need to have a thing onstage, like a gimmick. For example you could come up to the microphone, step out to the side and step out of your shoes. Or kick a shoe off.’
“We were like, ‘What the fuck?’ That was a literal suggestion.
“I don’t want to make it seem like he was a crazy person. He was shooting from the hip and it was something that just popped into his head.”
Thankfully Linkin Park opted not to adopt that particular piece of advice and they released their hugely successful debut album Hybrid Theory in October 2000.
And they made sure to stand up for themselves when it came to putting that album together.
Shinoda adds: “A real thing that happened as we finished Hybrid Theory, we were like the only person who is going to mix it is Andy Wallace.
“Andy Wallace mixed these records that blend samples of rock music and industrial sounds in a way that feels very modern to us.
“It’s full, it’s expert level mixing. We love this. And he also, by the way, mixed Nirvana’s Nevermind. He’s an icon. He does huge records too. He’s the only one who can mix Hybrid Theory.
“The next thing we knew, our A&R guy had done a test mix with somebody else. It was because of politics and stuff going on on his side.
“We were scared to death that this guy was just going to take our record and do his own thing with it and they were going to put it out that way.”
Again, Shinoda and co refused to back down.
“Those were the places where we had to put our foot down and have difficult conversations with people and fight for our own vision,” he says.
Linkin Park recently released new album From Zero, featuring Emily Armstrong on vocals in place of the late Chester Bennington.
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