Linkin Park are set to make a big announcement next week.
On August 24, the band posted a mysterious countdown clock of 100 hours leading up to an announcement, fuelling fan speculation that they were about to make their live return. However, as the clock ran out, it instead began counting forward, as the band reposted the link on social media alongside the phrase ‘It’s only a matter of time’.
Well now they have posted a new image, seemingly part of a larger band logo, confirming that they have news to share on September 05, adding simply ‘Be Part Of Something’.
Rumours of a reunion tour first began to circulate earlier this summer with Billboard reporting that booking agency WME had been exploring possible headline and festival dates for 2025.
Should those rumours be true, the exact lineup of the band, and who will step in to deliver lead vocals in place of the late Chester Bennington, is yet to be revealed. Sum 41‘s Deryck Whibley and Stand Atlantic‘s Bonnie Fraser were among the names suggested by fans but both have since denied that they are involved.
Earlier this year, in his Rock Sound 25 Icon interview, Mike Shinoda reflected on the band’s continuing legacy and growth even in their absence:
“To be in 2023 seeing brand new, teenage artists and bands show up referencing and loving Linkin Park music is such a blessing. We would have never guessed that we could be in this position. It’s crazy to think that some of them will be in this position later, they’ll grow up to be a band that somebody else references. That chain of influence and inspiration goes on. That’s a beautiful lineage. Separate from that, on the more practical or logical side of things, there’s the end of the year when everybody gets a lot of their data back, besides your Spotify Wrapped and stuff like that, more deep dive wrap ups that you get from management or your label or your publisher and so on. For a band that is technically inactive, Linkin Park has been on an upswing in the last two years. That is unbelievable. We got on one report for one DSP platform that we had gained multiple tens of millions of new listeners. Wow. That’s mind blowing. These are people that have never listened to Linkin Park and found us this year. All I can do is be grateful. There’s almost nothing else I can say about that. It’s just shocking. What do I say? Thank you.”
You can read that full interview with Mike inside his cover issue of Rock Sound magazine, available here.
