Ah Hybrid Theory, the album that made American rock band Linkin Park. Perhaps it was the powerful lyrics and expression in its songs, maybe it was that Linkin Park’s Heavy Metal sound mixed with a synth was considered unique at the time, or it could have just been that millions of teenage kids wanted to scream along with a downtuned guitar, no matter which of the above you pinpoint to Hybrid Theory’s success there is simply no denying that it was huge. Let me define just big this album was, it outsold, Metallica’s, The Spice Girl’s and Lionel Richie’s best selling albums by give or take a couple of million each, . A feat which I doubt many other debut albums can come anywhere to claiming.

They start off very well with the song Papercut, it isn’t too heavy and is well written, with the lyrics indicating a theme of self-consciousness or paranoia. The guitar riff at the start is good and it compliments the drums quite nicely. “One Step Closer” isn’t great, the lyrics are the first of many in the song that appear to deal with the troubles the lead singer experienced when his parents divorced.

“With You” starts off heavier but actually has more of the mellower bits in album towards the start and turns out to be quite a good, catchy track. The drumming is excellent and it has a sound that was to become signature to Linkin Park throughout this album and Meteora. “Points of Authority” continues this signature sound with some nice use of synth, but on the whole sounds a bit more like a filler in the album, rather than a serious track discussing serious issues, it does however, have a cool, classic Linkin Park ending.

“Crawling” was one of the popular tracks on the tracks on the album, and has some nice lyrics and shows off the talent off Linkin Park impressively. The next big track on the album is by far the best, and have could well have been what propelled it to such success. The start of “In The End” is great, as are the lyrics and the chorus is really something else. It shows powerful emotion through the lyrics and proves you don’t have to scream to prove something. Of all the tracks it is probably that deals with Bennington’s childhood problems the most.

“In The End”was the best track no doubt, but the strangest and most standout track on the album, and probably one of the strangest songs I’ve heard from a modern successful rock band is “Cure For The Itch.” As if the Mr. HAAAAAND intro wasn’t weird enough, the song has no real lyrics, or for that matter instruments, other than the drums. The only sound to be heard in this song was the that of the synth. But despite all this it’s not actually that bad of a song, the use of the synth is truly masterful and is really something to marvel at.

All in all, it’s not a bad buy, I thought that Meteora was a better album but the commercial success here was unrivaled.