The Singles Jukebox

Resurrected by the power of Shia LaBeouf’s chin…

[Video][Website]
[3.85]

Anthony Easton: I suspect the teenage sturm-und-drang of this will be much more enjoyable than whatever Michael Bay gets up to in Transformers 2.
[8]

Martin Skidmore: The first Transformers movie was crap, but even if the second is worse, this is still not good enough music for it.
[1]

Edward Okulicz: At their best, Linkin Park make meaningless songs sound meaningful, and their nonsense resonates, sneaking up on you. No such luck here, though.
[3]

Iain Mew: Don’t know if it’s just me, but friends (in their early/mid twenties, across a spectrum of music taste) all seem to gravitate towards nu-metal as karaoke choice. In that environment the charms of “In The End” — skyscraper hooks and fun dynamics — become rapidly apparent. I can’t imagine anyone ever leafing past pages of Korean pop songs trying to find “New Divide” though, not least because the fairly identical “What I’ve Done” already did its flattened out pomp rock much better.
[4]

Anthony Miccio: After the excessive balladeering of the last album, I’m glad to hear the band take it up a notch without shrieking. When the drums are pumped and the riffs are loud, I can more than deal with Chester Bennington’s samey serenity prayers.
[8]

Martin Kavka: One additional point taken off for the inanity of the lyrics, which sound as if they were written by someone on John McCain’s staff.
[4]

Tom Ewing: I admire Linkin Park’s survival instincts, and they’ve made a few fine singles in their day. This isn’t one of them: a marriage of Bon Jovi style pomp-rock, lyrics about burning time and ashes falling like snow, and a jagged, mechanoid, yet still somewhat sheepish middle eight. Sounds like it was written for the credits of a bargain shelf XBox game.
[3]

Dave Moore: Whaddaya know, auto-pilot Linkin Park with no rapping gets a 6 from me. Which means I would probably mindlessly rock out to this song playing on a car radio for a minute and then change the station. (Do people still listen to the radio?)
[6]

Ian Mathers: I can’t decide whether Linkin park moving from nu-metal to nu-grunge is a positive move or not. I guess I sort of miss Mike Shinoda? They’re just so blandly anonymous now that if I had heard it on the radio, I wouldn’t have guessed Linkin Park – I wouldn’t have guessed anyone. I wouldn’t have noticed the song.
[4]

Additional Scores

Hillary Brown: [4]
Andrew Casillas: [1]
Chuck Eddy: [3]
Michaelangelo Matos: [1]