Seven years after tragedy silenced the raging platinum-selling rock band Linkin Park, the group took a major step toward its resurrection at the Kia Forum on Wednesday night, launching a tour with new singer Emily Armstrong.
Following 17 years of radio hits and major touring success, the band’s original run ended abruptly with the 2017 suicide of singer Chester Bennington, who had long been the roaring counterpoint to Mike Shinoda’s rapped vocals. In his lyrics and performances, he was an artist adept at the extremes of fury and tenderness, and had connected deeply around the world.
A new singer who sounded too much like Bennington would only make fans miss him more. For his replacement, casting against type was the braver and more intriguing path, rebirthing Linkin Park as something more than a sad echo of its past. Armstrong, who previously sang for Los Angeles-based rock band Dead Sara, showed that potential at the Forum.
The band played in the round, on a mostly empty, high-tech stage shaped like an aircraft carrier. That meant great sight lines for more people in the arena, but muddier sound as a result.
Regardless, for two hours the band powered through 27 songs as tight as ever, beginning with two of their most popular early anthems, “Somewhere I Belong” and “Crawling.” Like most of the Linkin Park songbook, Bennington’s voice was central on the original recordings, but Armstrong dived in with confidence and appropriate angst, frequently bent over her mic, wailing at the edge of the stage.
On “Crawling,” she roared the signature anguished lyric, headbanging her blond locks: “I’ve felt this way before/So insecure!” as the crowd shouted along.
Genders aside, there are similarities between the current and former singers. Like Bennington, Armstrong is as capable with rich melodies as throat-ripping vocals, a natural fit with the established Linkin Park sound, which collides metal riffs with hip-hop, electronics and pop hooks.
“Have you met our friend Emily yet?” said a grinning Shinoda, bearded and wearing a leopard-print jacket, who did most of the talking between songs. He also noted the spontaneous, high-octane singalongs that were already filling the arena, with an affectionate nod to their late vocalist. “You already know that you guys are singing for Chester tonight, right?”
Later, he added, “We are thrilled to be back out here. It is not about erasing the past. It is about starting a new chapter into the future.”
That new chapter arrived with little warning less than a week ago, when Linkin Park announced its return, and introduced their new singer, via livestream performance from Warner Bros.’ Burbank studio and included a new song, “The Emptiness Machine.” A new album, “From Zero,” will land this November from the band’s longtime label, Warner Records.
Losing a talented, charismatic frontman is a devastating blow to any rock group, and few survive. If most Linkin Park fans were resigned to the band being over, the impulse to find a way back is in character for Shinoda, long its most driven creative force in the studio. But keeping the reunion a secret even as the group rehearsed with Armstrong, recorded an entire album and planned an arena tour was a startling feat.
“I’m sorry we had to keep this big secret from you for so long. It was very difficult for us,” Shinoda said from the Forum stage, then nodded toward Armstrong. “She had to not even hang out with her friends or tell anybody anything.”
There are other changes too. Drummer Rob Bourdon chose not to participate in the reunion and was replaced by Colin Brittain. While guitarist Brad Delson remains a full member, he will no longer tour with Linkin Park; filling in on the road is Alex Feder.
Fans were primed for this moment and roared with approval. There were many spontaneous chants of: “Linkin Park! Linkin Park! Linkin Park!” Bennington’s singular presence was irreplaceable, but Armstrong showed she had chops of her own to help the veteran act work toward something new.
Until “From Zero” is released, the band’s set list will remain almost entirely songs from the past. But Armstrong seemed up to the challenge, even on 2007’s agitated “Given Up,” originally featuring one of Bennington’s most superhuman vocals, as she paced the large stage, pumping her fist, reshaping the vocal to her voice.
At a different volume was “Lost,” as Shinoda tapped a delicate piano melody, and Armstrong added an understated vocal of regret (“I’m lost in these memories/Living behind my own illusion”). Originally recorded during sessions for 2003’s “Meteora,” the song remained unreleased until a 20th anniversary reissue of the album, but at the Forum it was rearranged to its most austere and vulnerable.
Late in the evening, Linkin Park delivered three of the band’s most popular and explosive songs of frustration and defiance — “Numb,” “In the End” and “Faint” — as Armstrong was nearly drowned out by a crowd passionately singing every word. In those moments, it hardly mattered who held the microphone, as thousands of the band’s most devoted followers took on the lyrics as their own, and maybe saw something of themselves in this new singer.
The Forum concert was the first night of a short international tour that continues Monday in New York, followed by stops in Hamburg, Germany; London; Seoul; and Bogota, Colombia. A longer tour is promised for 2025.
After years of silence, Linkin Park once again sounds like a band with a future.
