I’ve had this post brewing in the back of my mind for several weeks now.  It started when I was driving to work listening to Linkin Park, and I started trying to understand not just the words, but the meaning behind the words.  That’s when I started to realize what all their songs are about.  So, without further ado, I present you with a list of songs (in the order they appear in my playlist) and their meanings as interpreted by me:

- In The End:  Nothing you do matters, in the long run.

- Don’t Stay:  You betrayed me, so give me my life back and leave.

- Somewhere I Belong:  I can’t justify the way I’m being treated… I want to find somewhere I belong.

- Lying from You:  The very worst part of you is me; I have to pretend to be someone I’m not when I’m with you.

- Hit the Floor:  All I want is to feel like I’m not stepped on.

- Easier to Run: If I could change I would, but it’s easier to run.

- Faint:  This song is about staying with a girl who doesn’t care about him (and he knows it) because he’s all that she’s got.

- Figure.09:  By staying with you, I took what I hated and made it a part of me.

- Breaking the Habit:  This song is about committing suicide.

- From the Inside:  I swear for the last time I won’t trust myself with you.

- Nobody’s Listening (If the title weren’t indication enough):  I tried to give you warning but everyone ignores me.  (This song is especially sad taken in the context of Breaking the Habit.)

- Session:  This song shares a lot of lines with Somewhere I Belong, and it’s about the same thing.

- Numb:  Can’t you see that you’re smothering me, holding too tightly, afraid to lose control?

- Given Up:  Tell me what’s wrong with me… I’m my own worst enemy.

- Leave Out All the Rest:  When it’s my time to die, help me leave behind some reasons to be missed (and leave out all the rest).

- Bleed It Out:  “It” being “life”, of course.  “Rub myself out and noone cares.”  Another suicide song.

- Shadow of the Day:  Sometimes goodbye is the only way.

- What I’ve Done:  Let mercy come and wash away what I’ve done.

- Hands Held High:  (This song is something of a rant against Bush’s War in Iraq, and encourages people to stand for what they want to stand for.)

- No More Sorrow:  I’ve paid for your mistakes… your time has come to be replaced.

- Valentine’s Day:  Now you’re gone… I never knew what it was like to be alone on a Valentine’s Day.

- In Between:  I tried to be genuine, but it was harder than it seemed, and now I’m caught between my lies and the truth.  (Song seems to be about a relationship breaking up.)

- In Pieces:  I won’t be the one to leave this relationship in pieces (it’s your fault).  (Another breakup song.)

- The Little Things Give You Away:  I mean nothing to you… you just wanted someone to look up to you.

…

Ok.  Well.  Looking back on those, I see exactly two songs with a relatively positive message (What I’ve Done and Hands Held High).

Am I the only one wondering whether we should be trying to get psychiatric help for people who write songs like Somewhere I Belong or (worse) Breaking the Habit?

After figuring all this out, I’m not really sure I want to be listening to Linkin Park anymore.

The other day I mentioned Linkin Park’s Leave Out All the Rest being the closing credits song in the Twilight movie.

The DVD also contained a recording of a live performance of that song.  Turns out, Linkin Park sucks at singing.  The lead singer can’t stay on key.  He ended the song on the wrong note.  There isn’t much he could do to make me more disappointed in the band.

I’m brewing another Linkin Park-related post in the back of my head that I’ll write in the next day or two.

Yes, I mean that Twilight.  The movie based on the books by Stephenie Meyer.  It’s been sitting in our Netflix queue for months now, always getting pushed back in favor of other more interesting things (like my ongoing re-watch of Star Trek: Deep Space 9).  Somehow it made it to the top, though, and arrived in our mailbox.  So, like it or not, we had to watch it.

I read the books – yes, all of them. What can I say?  They brought out my inner teenage girl.  But if you took out the overdramatic angst and the lame lines, you’d have a decent, unique vampire book series.

The movie, on the other hand, took everything the book did wrong and did it worse.  Contrived plot?  They contrived it further (and left out some crucial character development).  Lame lines?  They wrote even more lame lines.  Overdramatic angst?  Edward was practically bipolar in the movie, and they played up Bella’s angst so much that it was the only character development they gave her.  As one-dimensional as she is in the books, she’s even more so in the movie.

The things the book did well, the movie took and did poorly as well.  Edward is supposed to be an attractive young man (so to speak) with an inherently seductive voice who is good with people.  They chose an unattractive kid with a boring voice and no acting skills.  He’s like… an ugly Hayden Christiansen.

The vampire powers in the book are interesting.  The special effects in the movie are cheesy and poorly done.  The lighting is always wrong.  The pale vampires in the book are supposed to be beautiful – in the movie the pale is ugly.  The sparkly skin in the book was supposed to be amazing – in the movie it looks like a disease.

In the book, Bella knows very little about sports.  In the movie, she acts like she knows nothing about sports, but when the Cullens ask her to umpire their baseball game, she appears to know the hand signals used by umpires to signal an “out”.

In the book, when Edward and Bella first meet in school, Edward can barely contain his desire to attack her.  In the movie, it looks like he’s about to throw up instead – quite the opposite reaction.

Oh, and the music was lame and sometimes misplaced for the entire movie.  It made me wonder why Linkin Park would agree to let them use Leave Out All the Rest as the ending credits song.

Blah.  I could go on.  Basically, the book was marginally passable as vampire fiction.  The movie was awful in virtually every way, and disappointing even though I expected disappointment.  Don’t watch it, if you liked the books, and if you didn’t, well, you should know better than to waste your time with this kind of movie