Review Summary: What an amazing first impression
Let’s begin another new year with more nu metal. Since this year’s January is debut month, let’s look at Linkin Park’s legendary debut. The foundations for the Linkin Park formula were laid out by “Hybrid Theory”, and while that formula would be perfected on “Meteora”, this album is pretty great in its own right.
Although “Hybrid Theory” is known for hits like “In the End” and “Crawling”, which you could use as an easy answer to the question “What does Linkin Park sound like?”, people don’t seem to remember how strangely this album begins. “Papercut” is a song about paranoia, about feeling observed all the time by… something. It also has Mike and Chester giving one of their most frantic, intense vocal performances. Even the repetitive, shrill electric sounds at the beginning feel haunting.
But paranoia isn’t the main theme of this album, those would be tension and angst. Everything about “One Step Closer”, from the repetitive, vaguely threatening riff, Chester’s singing, which keeps getting louder and louder until he’s screaming “Shut up when I’m talking to you!”, feels tense. When this album isn’t tense, it’s angry, righteously angry at a world that keeps hurting you. My favorite angry song on “Hybrid Theory” is “Points of Authority”, with its energetic, fast feel, contrast between clear electronic sounds and heavy riffs, and simple but truthful lyrics. We’ve all met someone who deserves to be told, as Chester yells on the chorus, “ you like to think you’re never wrong”, and worse, “ you want someone to hurt like you”.
The anger of those songs is contrasted by the melancholic, but still extremely tense “With You”. The song starts as a sort of ballad, with a much louder chorus, but you can feel the same sadness throughout the whole song, especially with those lyrics about trying to hold on to a dysfunctional relationship even though you know it’s doomed. The song is best summed up in this last line “No matter how far we’ve come, I can’t wait to see tomorrow with you”. The other great sad song is the album closer “Pushing me Away”. It’s another ballad progressively getting heavier, with Chester’s sweet and melancholic singing, saying goodbye to, once again, a dysfunctional relationship, and saying goodbye to the listener as well.
It’s a very good ending to the album but I have more mixed feelings on the songs between the first 4 and this one. “In the End” is the obvious hit, the typical Linkin Park song, so it’s surprising that it’s not earlier on the album. It has everything: electronic sounds, the call-and-response between Chester’s tense singing and screaming, Mike’s energetic rapping. But for whatever reason, I’ve never found that song all that interesting except for that line from Mike: “You wouldn’t recognize me anymore, not that you knew me back then”.
Then, “Crawling” has been mocked so many times on the Internet, especially for the “Crawling in my skin, these wounds they will not heal” chorus, but I’ll offer you a fresh, who-cares-what-people-say look at the song. Compared to most of the album, the lyrics aren’t that melodramatic. Linkin Park were often accused of making music for angsty, dramatic teens, but really, what’s wrong with that? This is some good angsty teen music. I also really like the main synth line, and the way the tension builds up to the chorus, how the song is catchy enough to get stuck in your head despite its dark atmosphere. I guess that’s Linkin Park in a nutshell.
The other songs have other nice touches, but I just don’t love them as much. “A Place for my Head” feels like the less interesting prototype of “Somewhere I Belong” except for the screaming “You tried to take the best me of, go away” part. There’s also “Forgotten”, with the energetic call-and-response from Chester and Mike’s rapping on the chorus. “By myself” is more interesting, with Mike’s tormented rapping and spoken words, with lyrics like “Do I trust nobody and live in loneliness”. But this album doesn’t really have anything like “Numb” waiting for you in the end, and it’s hard to tell which song is the predecessor to “Numb”, in terms of sound, lyrics and impact.
Though “Runaway” makes a great case for itself, with its fast, angry rhythm, and lyrics about trying to escape from your guilt. The “I wanna run away, and never say goodbye” chorus both gets you pumped up and makes you feel sorry for the narrator. It’s the real highlight of the album’s second half, along with the wonderfully sad “Pushing me Away”, and in some special editions, the gloomy ballad “My December”.
“Hybrid Theory” got its name from its mix of genres, its blend of sweetness, sadness and rage. It’s a new type of metal, taking more inspiration from rap and pop, but it still expresses real and painful emotions like all the great music of the past has, and like all good nu metal does. What a way to open the 2000s, and to start a career. It’s not a perfect album, due to its weaker middle and nice but not great ending. I don’t think I like it as much as “Meteora”, but wow, its good tracks are really amazing. They really did establish a talented band with a distinctive sound, one that you’d recognize anywhere no matter what you think of it, an accessible but interesting sound that got a new generation into metal. Those are all the things that make “Hybrid Theory” such a great debut, and my other favorite Linkin Park album.
