Linkin Park: A Thousand Suns over Jakarta’s night sky

After being stormed by Yellow Card, Panic!

After being stormed by Yellow Card, Panic! At the Disco, and Bad Religion in the Big Wave festival one day earlier, the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium, Jakarta, reverberated once again with great music as Linkin Park staged a spectacular show on September 21, 2011. There may not have been many stars or moonlight that night, but the 6-men band from California truly lightened up Jakarta’s cloudy sky as they brought nothing but a superb performance under the theme “A Thousand Suns” World Tour.

The talk about Linkin Park returning to Indonesia for the second time had been the hype for months prior to their arrival, and tickets were reportedly sold out days before the show. Outside of Jakarta, fans from cities such Bandung, Surabaya, Bali, Medan, and overseas geared up for the concert and many even came in organized groups or communities. The waves of these die-hard fans began to pour down on the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium at noon. Complete with Linkin Park or LP logo T-shirts and all kinds of associated accessories, fans of varying ages and origins began to form long massive queues in front of the entrance gates from mid-afternoon, hours before these were scheduled to open.

As the sun went down, and the gates were finally opened, enthusiasm drove the fans to storm in and fill every available space and seat inside the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium. Taking less than half the actual stadium capacity for the show, the allocated portion of around 20,000 seats were straight away jam-packed with hysterical crowds. After endless chanting of “Linkin Park! Linkin Park!” shouts from the crowd, the lights were dimmed, and the frenzy was on.

“The Requiem,” a short techno-mystical tune from their latest album, “A Thousand Suns,” became the opening score of the night, with only Joe Hahn, the DJ, appearing on stage. Soon after, Chester Benington and Mike Shinoda, the vocals of Linkin Park, guitarist Brad Nelson, Bassist Dave Farell, and Drummer Rob Bourdon emerged on stage with the powerful “Papercut,” and hysteria echoed around the entire stadium. “Thank you Jakarta, it’s good to be back here,” said Chester, which was replied by huge roars and applause.

“Given Up,” “New Devide,” and “Faint” rolled fast over the captivated audience who jumped around and danced passionately throughout the songs, including those in the seated sections. As the classical Linkin Park hits were played such as “Crawling,” “One Step Closer,” “Numb,” “Breaking the habbit,” “What I’ve done,” and “In the End,” the crowd transformed into a massive choir that shouted every word of the songs perfectly. Linkin Park also played hits from their latest album, “A Thousand Suns,” including the soundtrack for the movie, “Transformer 3,” “Iridesecent” and other tracks including “The Catalyst,” “Blackout,” and “Burning in the Skies.”

The band not only made great music, the performance of the band was also complemented with superb lightings and exceptional visual features, which became a fascinating combination of Live video preview, digital animation, portions of video clips, and views from multiple mini-cam placed in Joe Hahn’s DJ set, Mike Shinoda’s keyboards, and Rob’s drum set. The visual features combined with Linkin Park’s special Hip-hop-rock-electronical-pop- musical nuances created a complete spectacular performance that truly indulged all senses of the audience that night.

Linkin Park ended their amazing performance with a medley of “Bleed it Out” from the album, “Minutes to Midnight,” and “A Place for my Head” from their debut album, “Hybrid Theory.” After a total of 19 songs, the band parted saying goodbye, leaving their fans still craving for more. The performance of Linkin Park at the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium in Jakarta has added to the ongoing long list of international artists who have performed in Jakarta.

The frequent and many performances of international celebrity bands and singers have also placed Jakarta – and Indonesia – on the map of global shows and concert scenes. As this year is marked as a musical year for Indonesia, more and more prominent and legendary artists are now being listed to appear at international shows in Jakarta next year.

About the author

Avatar of Linda Hohnholz

Linda Hohnholz

Editor in chief for eTurboNews based in the eTN HQ.

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