Interview: Linkin Park New Single

99Rock Music News:  Interview: Linkin Park On Their New, Heavy Single ‘Guilty All The Same’ Feat. Rakim

“It’s louder; it’s more visceral than anything we’ve done recently.”

Linkin Park surprised fans (Mar 5) with the release of “Guilty All The Same,” the debut track from their forthcoming untitled album. The song mysteriously showed up in Shazam user’s news feeds tonight. Tagging any Linkin Park within the mobile app revealed a link titled “Listen to the New Single” (listen below).

“The reason we went with this single first is that we think it’s a good look into the DNA of the record that we’re putting out this summer,” co-frontman Mike Shinoda told Radio.com of the guitar-shredding 6-minute track.

“A few months ago I was making some demos and writing this stuff and it sounded like something that you could play on the radio,” Shinoda explained. “I listen to a lot of indie music… and I was listening to the demos and thought, I don’t want to make any of that music. What is it that’s not out there right now that I’m all about, that I’m fired up about that is a void? It ended up being this new  material.”

He added, “It’s louder; it’s more visceral than probably anything we’ve done recently. And we’re all really proud of it.”

The song features an epic intro, which at first listen could be mistaken for that of labelmate,Avenged Sevenfold. But nearly three minutes into the relentlessly hard rocking song, legendary MC Rakim can be heard spitting a few rhymes.

“That’s like one of my idols,” exclaimed Shinoda. “If you get into the nitty-gritty of his rhyme pattern and the topic in this song, it’s bananas what he is doing. He’s on the some Steve Vai s*** vocally.”

“It really is a highlight of the song,” added Chester Bennington.

For this new chapter in Linkin Park’s recording career, they’ll eschew mainstream alt-rock in favor of returning to their much edgier roots. Shinoda explained the music and passion on this record are rooted in the band’s earliest memories of their favorite punk rock bands, those bands weren’t afraid to try something different. “There’s an energy, an aggression and a meaning, like this attitude that I’ve got something to say and I need to get this out,” he said.

Linkin Park will hit the road with Thirty Seconds to Mars on the 25-city Carnivores Tour, kicking off August 8 in West Palm Beach, FL and wrapping up September 19 in Concord, CA.