* "When we went to write the record we didn't look at the commercial success of the first one and say, 'OK, that's sold this many copies, now we have to top it or make a record that will sell more records.' We don't make a record knowing if it's going to sell a bunch of copies. We just made Hybrid Theory, we just made music that we really enjoy making and that we were good at making and it happened to do really well. So, when we went to do Meteora we put the most pressure on ourselves to just make great music that we really appreciate and enjoy listening to, and so we went into the studio and did that. And I think that even though it hasn't been released to the public we feel that Meteora is a success 'cause we accomplished our goals and the bar that we set for ourselves to make good music. And we're comfortable with it and we're totally stoked and happy with it right now and it hasn't been even released."
-LAUNCH.COM Inteview
ON THE MEANING BEHIND THE NAME METEORA (As if this hasn't been talked about enough *rolls eyes...If I were Rob and the interviewer asked me this question, I would have to pull a Chester and tell the moron to "shove it up his ass." But I won't. Because I should try to be more polite like Rob is.):
* "Well, Brad and Mike saw it in a travel magazine when were traveling in Europe. It's actually a place in Greece. It's a rock formation and on top of this rock formation there's a monastery. It just seemed like this timeless epic kind of place that just kind of set a bar of what we wanted to do with the music on the new record, that's timeless and can go on forever and be listened to and enjoyed forever. And for the other four people in the band that didn't see it, we just thought it sounded cool basically."
-LAUNCH.COM Interview
ON THE WRITING PROCESS FOR METEORA:
* "This time writing the songs was a little different 'cause last time we kind of just had songs that we were playing for many years. And this time what we were able to do was start recording while we were on tour. We brought a studio with us out on our tour bus while we were on Ozzfest and we just starting laying down ideas while were on the road. So it was very different starting write while on the road. We had a head start, we had a six month head start by the time we got home, and when we got home we had all these, we had tons of ideas for songs. We probably had like 50 ideas for songs that we narrowed down to 20 when we went into the studio. I had Pro Tools to work on this record to write and record drums on to. On the last record I had microphones taped on to the ceiling with a four track, so it was definitely more convenient and time efficient. I think having more technology to be able to do all of this stuff really helped me to think of new things and be more creative."
-LAUNCH.COM Interview
ON THE 40 MINUTE TIME LENGTH OF METEORA (*pushes Rob aside, jumps in his chair and sits across from interviewer* You know what? Shove this damn question up your ass along with the other if there's room!):
* "For our songwriting and for putting the record together we just try to focus on the meat of it. We kind of cut off the fat, we don't do guitar solos and long drawn out stuff like that. When we look at a song, we look at it as a piece of art or like a movie. Every bit of that song should catch your attention and grab your ear and be very exciting. We took those 18 songs that we had in the works and we really thought of it, 'OK, lets put 11,12, 13 on to a record so when you push play you can listen to the whole record from start to finish and have it capture your attention and your ears and there's never a moment where you start thinking about something else.' We really put the record together like that, so it works like that."
-LAUNCH.COM Interview
ON THE THEME OF METEORA:
* "Well, I definitely think that Meteora has a string, there's a thread that ties Hybrid Theory to Meteora. They're about universal emotions and feelings, the kind of thing everyone goes through on an everyday basis. The really cool thing about it is that Chester and Mike write their lyrics, but they don't tell anybody exactly what they were thinking when they wrote them, so you could interpret them entirely differently way than I interpret it. Some of the songs I don't even want to know what they were thinking when they wrote it, because for me I can get something totally different out of it when I listen to it than what they were thinking when they wrote it. The lyrics are really honest and revealing. They reveal emotions, but they don't really reveal specific things."
-LAUNCH.COM Interview
ON THE CRITICS (A.K.A.- the musicians hacks who were never talented enough to make it on their own but can sure dish out insults out of their own bitterness):
* "To be honest, I don't pay too much attention to it. I don't read a lot of reviews and I really don't read a lot of press about us too often. I really just concentrate what our fans think and how we're feeling and doing our job as musicians and how we're treating our fans." (I would whistle and cheer @ this point, but I don't know how to whistle. Yeah. Pathetic, aren't I?)
-LAUNCH.COM Interview