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Minutes to Midnight is Linkin Park's third studio album that was released, depending on location, between May 9, 2007 and May 18, 2007. It has been certified 2x Platinum worldwide for sales of over 4.7 million copies. It is also their first album with a parental advisory label.

The album debuted at #1 in the United States and in 15 other countries, including the UK and Canada, around the world. In the U.S. the album had the biggest first week sales of 2007 with 625,000 albums sold, but it was later surpassed by Kanye West's album Graduation. The album was certified Platinum (One million albums sold) in the U.S. and shipped over 3.3 million albums worldwide in its first four weeks of release.

There are two versions of the album cover. Both feature all six members of the band in black clothing. On the slipcase, the band members are looking away from the camera and on some of the standard jewel case covers, most of the band members are looking at the camera. The order of the band (from left to right) is as follows: Chester Bennington, Phoenix, Joe Hahn, Brad Delson, Rob Bourdon, and Mike Shinoda.

The lead single from the album, "What I've Done", was digitally released on April 3 in the UK and April 2 in the U.S. The CD single was released on April 30.

Track listing

All songs written by Linkin Park From Minutes To Midnight.

1. "Wake" – 1:41
2. "Given Up" – 3:09
3. "Leave Out All the Rest" – 3:29
4. "Bleed It Out" – 2:44
5. "Shadow of the Day" – 4:50
6. "What I've Done" – 3:25
7. "Hands Held High" – 3:53
8. "No More Sorrow" – 3:42
9. "Valentine's Day" – 3:17
10. "In Between" – 3:17
11. "In Pieces" – 3:38
12. "The Little Things Give You Away" – 6:24

B-Sides

• "No Roads Left" – 3:48 (Was available from iTunes with the pre-order of the album only)

Release

The album was delayed multiple times, first scheduled for summer 2006, then fall 2006, then early 2007, until finally, the release date was set for May 15, 2007. In an interview in September 2006, Shinoda explained, "When songs are pouring out you don't ever want to stop that. We already have over 100 roughs for songs. We've narrowed it down since but we're not ready to commit to those yet.

From the late stages of the demo sessions, "QWERTY", which was rumored to be on Minutes to Midnight, has appeared on the Linkin Park Underground v6.0 CD on December 5, 2006 in both live and studio demo versions.

"This was a year-and-a-half long process of really hard work and experimentation in the studio that yielded about 150 rough songs," guitarist Brad Delson told Billboard.com. "Not only is this album incredibly diverse, but the depth of the material is really strong."

The first single, "What I've Done", was released April 2, 2007, and debuted at number one on the U.S. Modern Rock chart.

"Given Up", "What I've Done" and "No More Sorrow" made their live debut on April 28, 2007 in Berlin. Live performances of these three songs at the Sessions@AOL were released on AOL on May 5, 2007.

On May 12, 2007, Linkin Park played "Bleed It Out" on Saturday Night Live, along with "What I've Done". Also, on May 18, 2007, Linkin Park appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live, and again performed "What I've Done" and "Bleed It Out".

CD/DVD Special Editions

A CD/DVD Special Edition of Minutes to Midnight is available. It is designed to look like a book and contains a 24-page art book featuring the lyrics and conceptual art by artists who are friends with the band, along with pictures of the recording process. The cover of the North American version is grey, but in all other areas is black.

The bonus DVD contains the following:

• Advanced Resolution PCM Stereo (48 kHz/24-bit) versions of all 12 tracks
• The Making of Minutes to Midnight Documentary
• The Making of "What I've Done"
• The "What I've Done" music video

The DVD-ROM features are:

• A PDF booklet with lyrics
• A flash widget and a fansite toolkit.
• One Instant Messenger Buddy icon
• Exclusive DVD links to the official Linkin Park website, only accessible through the DVD
• Screensavers
• Wallpapers

The band also released a Super Fan Edition of the album which is only available on their online store. The only difference to the Special Edition was the book (being of 68 pages rather than 24). The DVD contains the same content.

There have been a number of problems with the DVD. Users have experienced problems accessing the DVD-ROM features, as certain computers may not be able to access the enhanced portion of this disc. In Canada, Warner Records recalled the CD/DVD Edition due to the faulty DVD. The final release date for the repaired discs is yet to be known. As such orders are no longer available from the website BandMerch.com, nor is it available in stores. It is still available at some local Wal-Marts, yet the DVD is still faulty.

Clean Editions

There were non-PA releases of both the regular CD and the special edition CD. The songs "Given Up", "Bleed It Out", and "Hands Held High" were slightly edited, by the removal of profanities all together. In Malaysia, there are only clean editions available. The Clean Edition also has a separate hard cover for the album.

Sound

Overall Minutes to Midnight is Linkin Park's softest studio album, focusing more in layers and textures of the music, thus creating a more melodic approachable sound. In an interview with Chester Bennington it is explained that the new album is a mix of punk, classic rock, and hip-hop beats. "Rick has brought more of a stripped down, classic-rock and hip-hop kind of feel."

In another interview with Chester, he stated "This time around, Mike Shinoda is singing a lot more. It may seem like he's not on the record, but he's doing a lot of the harmonies. He also sings a couple of songs alone. We're presenting ourselves in a different way."

"We were looking back at the things that we had done in the past… and I think we just figured that we had exhausted that sound. It was easy for us to replicate, it was easy for other bands to replicate, and we just needed to move on," said Mike Shinoda.

This is their first album where Mike Shinoda sings lead vocals for a full length track ("In Between"), rather than rapping. It is also the first to contain guitar solos (particularly on "In Pieces" and "The Little Things Give You Away"). Unlike the two previous studio albums, Minutes to Midnight contains profanity and politically-charged lyrics.

Mike Shinoda performs his rapping vocals on only two tracks, "Bleed It Out" and "Hands Held High". This is a significant decrease compared to previous albums. The rap vocals on the album are much closer styled to Mike Shinoda's side project Fort Minor than his traditional Linkin Park verses. Despite a decrease of Mike Shinoda as rapper, he has two solo lead songs on the record. In addition to his rapping on "Hands Held High", which features background vocals from the entire band (the "men's choir" singing "Amen" is actually each member of the band), he also sings the lead vocals for "In Between". He also sings solo on the bonus track "No Roads Left" in a much more aggressive rock style than on "In Between" with no backing vocals from Bennington. Bennington & Shinoda play guitar on "No Roads Left", the iTunes exclusive bonus track.

All scratching elements by Mr. Hahn that existed in the previous two studio albums are largely absent, except on the songs "What I've Done", "Valentine's Day", "In Pieces", "In Between" and "The Little Things Give You Away". Hahn contributes more with programming, electronica, and other elements to many of the songs.

Guitarist Brad Delson experimented with an E-Bow when the band was piecing together "The Little Things Give You Away". The band decided not to use the effect for the solo in that song and instead ended up creating "No More Sorrow" out of the effect (Brad shakes his finger on the strings of his guitar creating the long reverb effect similar to the sound of an E-Bow). In "Given Up" you can hear him jingling his keys while Mike Shinoda claps.

Reception

real fans of linkin park has hated that EMO INDIEot album

Demo and working titles

• "Given Up" - 21 Stitches
• "Leave Out All the Rest" - Fear & When My Time Comes
• "Bleed It Out" - Accident
• "Hands Held High" - Song Q
• "No More Sorrow" - EBow Idea
• "In Pieces" - Pictures
• "The Little Things Give You Away" - The Drum Song
• "No Roads Left" - Patients & No Roads But One

Leak

On May 4, 2007, 10 days before its official world release, the real Minutes to Midnight was leaked. The following day, Mike Shinoda posted his response to the leak:

It couldn't be more exciting to give you all new music, especially after all the hard work we put into it. This album was almost a year and a half of experiments, mistakes, inspiration, and careful craftsmanship. We put everything we had into these songs, and want you to hear every second of it. I can't wait for you to absorb all the levels of meaning in the songs, and the layers of music, eventually forming your own ideas about what the songs mean to you.

At the same time, a leak leaves out some very important parts of this piece of work. We put months of creative energy into the ART of the record, in the booklet, special edition, and big book … almost as long as it took to record hybrid theory . The album has amazing photos, lyrics, and notes about how the songs came together — it's the visual half of the record. On the other hand, the super-special-edition book is packed with exclusive images, stories of the making of the songs, gorgeous art, the CD and a DVD that tells the story, showing the actual moments of inspiration caught on camera. For me, it's almost hard to imagine anyone really experiencing this album without that part of it.

Even the song sequence alone is very important. It's WAY different to hear the songs in a random order than to listen to this record from beginning to end. At the very least, if you've already downloaded the songs, do us a huge favor and listen to them in the right order … it'll be way more rewarding.

— Mike Shinoda

Personnel

• Chester Bennington — lead vocals, guitar on "No Roads Left" and "Shadow of the Day".
• Rob Bourdon — drums
• Brad Delson — lead guitar, piano (Live)
• Dave "Phoenix" Farrell — bass guitar, backing vocals
• Joseph Hahn — turntables, sampling, programming,
• Mike Shinoda — vocals, MC, keyboard, rhythm guitar, producer (co-producer) lead vocals On "No Roads Left", "Hands Held High" and "In Between".

Other contributors

• Rick Rubin - producer

Charts and sales

Singles

Other charting songs

References

1. "Billbord.com-discography-Linkin Park-Bleed it out". Retrieved 2007-06-29.
2. http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/retrieve_chart_history.do
3. . /news/minutes-to-midnight-a-worldwide-success/ "Minutes To Midnight A Worldwide Success". {{cite web}}: Check |url= value (help)
4. http://www.minutes2 . /
5. UK Music
6. http://minutes-to-midnight.blogspot.com/
7. "Timbaland Soars to No. 1 After Sales Explosion". Billboard. April 12 2007. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
8. http://music.aol.com/video/what-ive-done-aol-sessions/linkin-park/1887990
9. "Minutes to Midnight" Special Edition CD/DVD
11. Folhateen Article. April 3, 2007.
12. "Linkin Park Say Nu-Metal Sound Is 'Completely Gone' On Next LP". Retrieved 2007-06-01.
13. Mike Shinoda (May 15 2007). Minutes to Midnight (Special Edition) (Music Documentary). {{cite AV media}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
14. http://www.gamespot.com/users/-MlKE-/show_blog_entry.php?topic_id=m-100-25014768&print=1
15. http://www.coffee-bytes.com/node/554 Linkin Park's Minutes to Midnight
16. http://linkinpark.com/biography
17. "Minutes to Midnight Leaked". Retrieved 2007-06-01.
18. Argentinian Album Chart
19. Australian Top 50 ARIA Album Chart
20. Austrian Album Chart
21. Belgium Flanders Album Chart
22. Belgium Wallonian Album Chart
23. Brazilian Album Chart
24. Canadian Album Chart
25. Chile Top 10
26. Croatian International Album Chart
27. Cyprus International Album Chart
28. Czech Album Chart
29. Danish Album Chart
30. Estonian Album Chart
31. European Top 100 Albums Chart
32. Finnish Albums Chart
33. French Album Chart
34. German Album Chart
35. Greek Album Chart
36. Hungarian Album Chart
37. Irish Album Chart
38. Israeli Album Chart
39. Italian Album Chart
40. Japan Album Chart
41. Korean Album Chart
42. Mexico Top 100l Album Chart
43. Mexican Gold Certification
44. Netherlands Albums Chart
45. New Zealand Album Charts
46. Norwegian Albums Chart
47. Polish Album Chart
48. Portugal Album Chart
49. Spain Album Chart
50. Swedish Album Chart
51. Swiss Album Chart
52. "5-Music Top 20".Taiwan 5-Music Chart..
53. Taiwan G-Music Western Chart
54. Taiwanese Album Chart
55. UK Album Chart
56. Albums Chart
57. Venezuelan Album Char
58. ^ Billboard Albums Retrieved May 24 2007
59. Billboard.com - Linkin Park artist chart history
60. - Artist Chart History - Linkin Park
61. Music Charts - Hot 100 - Billboard 200 - Music Genre Sales - Leave Out All The Rest
62. Music Charts - Hot 100 - Billboard 200 - Music Genre Sales - Hands Held High
63. Music Charts - Hot 100 - Billboard 200 - Music Genre Sales - No More Sorrow

External links

• Linkin Park's official website
• Minutes to Midnight at MetaCritic
• Minutes to Midnight official lyrics page

• Pages with empty short description
• Linkin Park albums
• Enhanced CDs
• Warner Bros. Records albums
• Albums produced by Rick Rubin
• 2007 albums