Linkin Park From Zero Listening Party
My first listen of the new album!
In the US today, many record stores around the country held a listening party for From Zero. I was able to attend one at Bull Moose, a great local music store in my area.
The event was between 2p and 3p with some free swag and a raffle for some t-shirts. I arrived about 15 minutes early and it didn’t really look like anything was going on. There were the usual bustle of customers, but nothing unusual in my opinion. A worker did confirm that everything was going to start at 2pm, though.
At about 2p, one of the workers announced things. She put some swag on the counter. A line was quickly formed and people picked up the free stuff and were handed a raffle ticket for afterwards.
There was some technical difficulties getting things to play. It looked to me like this was some sort of stream and that they needed to log into something to get it started, but it took about 10 minutes or so before they got that all sorted.
There was a very brief intro from the band before the album was played.
I don’t want to spoil too much, but the album is amazing. Of the new songs, the ones that I liked the most were Casualty and IGYEIH, both of which have lots of screaming. The other songs vary in styles and overall it all sounded very “Linkin Park” to me. The only song that didn’t grab me on this first listen was Overflow, which seemed calm and zen, but it will probably sound great with headphones.
Speaking of that, the album was just played through the store’s ceiling speakers which certainly were not high fidelity. And the volume had to be kept reasonable since there were actual customers in there trying to shop. I mostly floated around, standing directly under speakers to try and hear things as best I could.
Before anyone asks: No, I did record anything.
After the album finished, we headed back to the front for the raffle. They had about four t-shirts to raffle off. I did not win one, but the worker said they had more in the back and came back with another three or four. She said they were “for the staff”, but they didn’t want them so she was also going to raffle them.
I’m thankful the staff didn’t want them, because I won one!
Besides the t-shirt, I also got a lanyard, stickers and a small poster.
I remain super-excited for the album release on Friday, November 15th. My two most-played albums this year have been Invincible Shield by Judas Priest and Phantoma by Unleash the Archers. I think there’s a good change that From Zero will surpass them both.
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