Linkin Park – ‘Burn It Down’

On the first single from Linkin Park‘s forthcoming Living Things, Chester Bennington unpacks, yet again, his propensity for screwing things up. Before zooming into the anguished yowl we’ve come to demand of a Linkin Park chorus, Bennington delivers some of his prettiest verses ever ”“ and he does it over a burbling synth groove that wouldn’t be out of place in an industrial-friendly rave. (Mike Shinoda is, per Linkin Park tradition, on hand for a quickie run of unassuming rhymes.) There’s a certain poetry to the “Burn It Down” approach, which draws a sharp line between the smooth and the rough ”” and leaves open the option of just dancing the night away. In the end, the fire down below comes out on top.