Coming from a hiphophead, I get what Jay Z meant. At the time underground rap was was not as popular, only difference was Mike had the money and power behind making the sound 'big' like Jay z mentioned, so it came off like a very polished and clean underground hiphop album. Think of Eminem's first albums with Dre, And Em came from the underground
The Best Hip Hop album for me and Mike Shinoda is legendary music artist and rapper. This album is hip hop culture inside one CD. Every song is incredible, every lyric is so emotional. Pure hip hop art. After 16 years im still listening this album everyday and its still amazing. Part of my life, THANK YOU MIKE, its your hip hop soul signature on this CD and I love your hip hop feelings, cos I got same. Hip Hop, dont stop.
watching this again for the first time in 15 years , i never realized how (in my opinion) jay-z was a terrible choice for giving feedback on the songs. there were so many awkward silences here where both mike and brad either disagreed and didn’t speak up or didn’t know what on earth he was even talking about lol. he should’ve called upon Rick Rubin
+Nixlas Park Yes, well Mike released the only album (and 1 mixtape) from his Fort Minor side project in 2005. Though Linkin Park released their 2nd album in 2003, then didn’t release their next album until 2007, so he did FM during the interim. I think LP were on a brief hiatus for some of this period? Hence how Mike had the time to do Fort Minor, though I feel LP May have also been touring during this hiatus? Edit - Just checked, LP barely did any concerts during 2005-06, so that coincides exactly with when Mike was doing FM