LP Underground Tour 2003

Introduction

The LP Underground Tour was Linkin Park's first tour for Meteora. The tour consisted of sixteen shows, with a few other performances thrown in between dates, including a makeup show in Hamburg, Germany for a cancelled show in September 2001.

Before the tour

After Projekt Revolution 2002 and the shows in Mexico City, MX and West Hollywood, CA, the band took the rest of 2002 and some of 2003 off to write and record their upcoming album, Meteora.

Summary

The tour kicked off in Milano, IT on February 23rd. The band used one setlist for the entire tour. The set opened with Session into Don't Stay and ended with One Step Closer. According to reports of the show, Chester stopped With You because two fans fell down in the pit. The show also featured the largest debut of songs in Linkin Park's history. Session, Don't Stay, Somewhere I Belong, Lying From You, Faint, From The Inside, Hit The Floor and Easier To Run were all debuted at the show.

Next the band played a show in Hamburg, a make up show from a cancelled show there in 2001. The show was originally cancelled because of the September 11th terrorist attacks in New York City, NY.

Moving on, Linkin Park performed shows in Paris, FR and Nottingham, ENG. The show in Nottingham, ENG was a private show for BBC Radio 1. The band offered tickets to the show under the "UK Week" promotion offered through the LPU, and fans didn't know what to expect, other than it was an event in Nottingham, ENG. A small LPU Meet & Greet was held at the show, and fans were encouraged to enter Meet & Greets for the other shows in the UK as well. To gain admission to the show, either you won tickets from the LP Underground or via BBC Radio 1. The first public recordings of the new songs from Meteora came from the show as well via the online webcast and radio broadcast.

The band also did a Top Of The Pops performance a few days after the show in Nottingham, ENG. Very few Linkin Park fans were at the show, but the LPU gave away free tickets to those who wanted to attend. Mike was reportedly sick at the show. There was a lot of messing around between songs (and even during songs). The intro to A Place for My Head was played by fan request, but the song was aborted due to time constraints. After more fan requests two days later at the CD:UK/Headliners show, it was played in full. Another highlight of this show was a rare performance of A.06.

After the UK Week was over, the band returned to the United States to kick off U.S. leg of the tour. The first show in the United States took place in Worcester, MA. Due to a lower than expected demand from the LP Underground, the band sold tickets to the public for this show. Worcester, Detroit, St. Louis, Dallas, and Los Angeles night two all had limited tickets for the public available. This was also the first USA performance of the Meteora songs.

The show in Detroit, MI was filmed for the MTV $2 Bill Series. An MTV anchor did an intro to the show in the crowd. It is sometimes mislabeled as March 25, 2003, which was the date it was first shown on television. Mike helped mix the audio for the broadcast.

The band wrapped up the tour with two back-to-back shows in Los Angeles, CA. At midnight between the two back-to-back Los Angeles shows, Meteora was released. Linkin Park went over to Tower Records after the show and held a signing for over 4,000 fans who had just bought the CD.

Live Debuts

Memorable Moments

According to an interview in 2014, ten minutes before the show in Nottingham, ENG, Chester punched the dressing room wall and injured his hand. Here is a quote taken from the interview, "Linkin Park performed at Rock City in Nottingham last night (Monday), despite the lead singer hurting his hand just minutes before going on stage. There were about 1000 fans there and the band played tracks from their new album 'Meteora' due out later this month. Chester Bennington, the lead singer, took his shirt off to show off his skinny tattooed body - much to the approval of the girls in the crowd. Ten minutes before the gig he punched the dressing room wall and badly bruised his hand. He had to keep an ice pack on it but told us he wasn't fazed by his injury: "My hand doesn't matter, you can cut it off for all I care. As long as my voice works. If I lost all feeling from my neck down, if you could string me up and I could sing, I'd be there doing the shows. The fans come first and the shows come first too and that's all that matters to us. We really don't care about anything else except for the music and the kids.""

Collaborations

Christian Lindskog of Blindside came out and sang One Step Closer with the band at many shows of the tour. Here is what Blindside had to say about it, "At the famous Roseland Ballroom in New York City, the guys in Linkin Park invited Christian up to sing on their final song One Step Closer. It was a great moment for both fans and the band. Only a few shows have passed, but this tour has brought us to a whole new level. We want to thank Linkin Park and their amazing fans for making us feel so welcome."

Touring bands

Blindside

Releases

The band released several live tracks from the tour: Lying From You from an unknown show, One Step Closer from the Detroit, MI show, From The Inside from the Hamburg, HH show and Easier To Run which featured a combo of the Manchester, ENG and Worcester, MA shows.

Several videos from the tour were also show through the LPU website and additional footage can also be seen on LPTV.