Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda On ‘Hybrid Theory’ Reissue: ‘Is It Going To Be Sad For People?’

Linkin Park‘s Mike Shinoda recently revealed that he questioned whether celebrating the 20th anniversary of Hybrid Theory would be “too sad for people.”

During an interview with Apple Music’s Strombo, Shinoda talked about his doubts concerning the release and how he came to realize now is the right time to celebrate:

“I felt like this timing, it can be a really nice moment to reflect on the journey and have it be celebratory. I didn’t want it to be sad, was part of the problem. I was like, it’s too early to do this. Is it going to be sad for people? And I think we managed to gauge it right.

People have been celebrating the hell out of this album this month. And we’ve gotten like, if you look at the chart position of this, it’s like a re-release box set and went number one in Australia and a couple… It’s been well received in a lot of places, which is, we’re so grateful for it.”

He also talked about how the death of Chester Bennington was difficult to understand:

“Linkin Park being part of all of our DNA, when that got fractured and taken apart, in a sense, I don’t think anybody could really understand. Because you can’t relate that to anything else. It’s not family, it’s not friends, it’s not brotherhood, it’s not business. It’s all of those things wrapped together, and it’s really, like in a negative sense, it’s like enmeshed.

For better or worse, that could be something that is not very healthy, but you also can’t do it any other way. I don’t think any of us are at liberty or would even be capable of explaining it to anybody. You couldn’t even get a therapist and be like, okay, here’s what I feel or here’s what’s going on and whatever.

You could spend years on it, and still not crack the surface of what the meaning of all that emotional information is, I feel like.”

Elsewhere during the interview, Shinoda also talked about how the band has always enforced inclusivity:

“I think me and a web designer designed our site, and one of our rules was no homophobic comments, nothing that minimize his people. And that, in those days, if you can think, going back to our conversation about what the other bands were like, there’s no way. We had to have been maybe the only one who would say that and enforce that on their website.”

Listen to the interview here.

Recently, Linkin Park shared rare unseen footage of the making of the “One Step Closer” video in celebration of Hybrid Theory‘s 20th anniversary. Check out the footage below.

As we continue the #HybridTheory20 celebration, we wanted to share this recently uncovered never before seen footage from the making of the One Step Closer video. https://t.co/730oDpV1Qy pic.twitter.com/k5HxhkJwwt

— LINKIN PARK | #HybridTheory20 (@linkinpark) October 24, 2020

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