Wywiad - Cleveland Radio 07/2002 ( Mike i Phoenix )

RS = Robin Swen
M = Mike
PH = Phoenix

Mike and Phoenix walk in, Mike has this huge hat on which hides his BLUE hair. They are very - we're not hugely famous, just average joe types - and say hi. Mike comes around the table to shake my hand and flashes that too cute smile and they sit. Already plotting mischief i can see. I ask them if they want to talk about anything special and Phoenix says, very straight faced, "politics" . (coming out of crazytown butterfly)

RS :
crazytown on 95.5 wbru ( heavy breathing into the mic) - and that breathing into the mic is the boys of LINKIN PARK. I can hear the screaming out there, ( mike makes a girly screaming noise "put your clothes back on, you're disgusting and revolting!" - in a girly voice).  You guys wanna introduce yourselves?
Mike:
Hi I'm jermiane, from linkin park
Phoenix:
I'm skee-lo
RS:
skee-lo from Linkin park?, what's up guys
Mike:
(laughing) his name is Phoenix
Ph:
his name's Mike
RS :
concert tonight, ya'll psyched?
Mike:
yes, it's gonna be good
RS:
people are outside killing each for tickets to your concert.
Mike :
really? do they know that orgy an disturbed aren't gonna be there?  (note - reference to when they played WBRU show last december with orgy and disturbed)
RS:
yes they do
Mike:
and they still wanna come huh? weird
RS:
and in my hand i have the final two tickets to the concert, (Mike - "dun dun dun!!!") and i think i could probably get someone to come here and do something insane to get these tickets. anything, cause the people out there are Nut-ty.
Mike &Phoenix:
we'll think about it, yah, we'll get back to you after this commercial message. ( insert conserative voice - over type voice)
RS :
alright, so we're gonna have some questions for the guys after this, it's one step closer, BRU
**********ONE STEP CLOSER ****
RS:
Linkin Park on 95.5 wbru and linkin park in the studio...
Mike:
What's up (again, in freaky psuedo-chick voice)
RS :
down at linkinpark.com your fans, (Mike and Phoenix : "YYEEEAAHHH!!!")
Mike:
  first of all i have to say on the air that this is the best idea i've heard of a way to come up with questions to interview us with.
Phoenix:
from Linkinpark.com
mike:
  you, robin , got on the website, our message board, and started a strain that says ( he quotes the message board thing i posted which was LP questions you want answered.) (then we have chit chat about how the UK people had questions and phoenix says "Oh, but the UK people can't hear us", and i talk about how they can listen on wbru.com. then they talk about how they are soo behind in the tech revolution.)
RS :
my favorite question is... you guys got famous pretty quick, and you're meeting all these famous people, does it freak you out?
Phoenix : 
  YES!, we were recently doing shows with deftones, we're going to be playing with them in europe for a while, and that's a band that we've looked up to for quite a number of years. we've gotten to talk with them a couple of times. that's always kinda - a little bit nerve-racking as well as guys from incubus and other bands. Rod Stewart was at our practice studio, right before we left on this tour, and that was kinda funny.
RS:
  did you wet yourself when you met them?
Mike:
  because we love rod stewart so much, dave means, uh, phoenix means, oh gosh darnit. (collective laughter) Rod Stewart and me, Phoenix and rod stewart.
RS:
   he is pretty sexy
(going back to the website questions)
Mike :
   I'm gonna find a good one. ..........How did the band get started? I'm gonna start with that one.
Phoenix :
okay, easy one i've handled that one before. want me to answer it? (in the studio mike and phoenix give each other this - why do we let you out of the cage? look,  and laugh. This, though simple, is extemely funny. There's this moment of silence and Phoenix realizes he should talk .... quick) Mike-and-Brad-met-in-junior-high
mike:
how old were we when we met?
Phoenix:
    7th or 8th grade? (mike :we were 13) it gets changed. then, rob had played with brad with bands in high school. joe went to artcenter in pasadena with mike. I went to UCLA with brad and chester we met through a mutual friend. and we started playing, roughly, 5 years ago.
Mike:
(reading from the printout of the message board thread) what are some of the musical influences that helped shape our band?
Phoenix:
uuuh ( clearly too slow cause mike whips in with...)
mike :
deftones, roots, nine inch nails, jurassic five, apex twin. okay. how did we get started... we answered that question, but actually, the funny thing is that um we've been talking about lately a little more than we used to, is that, when we started, we would play a show a month, maybe less. we would never play. so like we weren't even involved in the LA music scene. like we were sitting in our stupid little rooms and writing music all the time. and so all of a sudden we started playing a couple shows and nobody knew who we were. it was a joke, dude. it was great.
RS:
but when you started playing you were under a different name, right?
Mike:
  yeah, when phoenix was in the original form of this band, it was called Xero with an" X", X-E-R-O. and then we changed it to Hybrid Theory when chester joined. actually changed it to Linkin Park after we had finished recording the album, really late in the game. our street team was up to like 400 kids maybe. so we were kinda bummed, like we were thinking we're not gonna be able to get the word out to all these people that we're changing the name but luckily it worked out.
RS:
so tell us about the album. we've all heard one step closer but your next single is crawling right?
Phoenix :
crawling we thought would be a good second song because, following one step closer, it has a bit of a different range and a different feel, the album covers a lot of our influences musically , so it was a good second song to show some of the diversity on the album.
Mike:
(in a prim and proper voice) It shows a different, a different color of the emotional spectrum ( at this point mike ackowledges that he was being weird and makes a farting noise into the mike and several other gases erupt from various orifices. laughter included )
***************CRAWLING*****
RS :
it's crawling from linkin park on 95.5 wbru and the boys have finally decided how they are going to give away the final two tickets to the show  (then we discuss the contest. mike says " it is a contest and you can play it"- in this ren from ren and stimpy voice. mike gave it away by asking people to name two songs off of the hybrid theory ep - then phoenix jumps in and adds that they also have to know the artwork - collective moans in providence - this is after they explain that they made only a thousand copies and it's really rare. Phoenix says he's doing this because you always download the songs from NAPST-euingtytg. (he was going to say Napster but stopped)
Phoenix :
you can download the songs from Napst---e...r
Mike:
not anymore
Phoenix :
but you can still download the songs from other places
Mike:
or you can go and find out on the message board but that will take time.
( more ticket giveaway stuff)
RS:
do you guys like napster at all?
Phoenix:
YES
Mike:
, napster's cool, i like it
RS:
are your songs on napster?
Phoenix:
YES ( i was noticing that phoenix was into the monosyllabic affirmatives)
RS :
are you guys ever gonna do the dave matthews thing and release an album on-line?
Mike :
um, we don't know, how do you expect us to answer that question?
RS :
well, are you thinking about it?
Phoenix:
the answer is yes ( but i think this was said sarcastically)
Mike :
the answer is, let's look into the magic crystal ball . in fact let's look into the magic crystal ball and look at a question. (reading from the message board ) " are they, meaning your band,LINKIN PARK, planning on being on any tours like ozzfest or tattoo the earth? etc?" this is a question from anthony dynamic, a street soldier on our message board
Phoenix:
YES ( are you seeing the monosyllabic thing here?)
mike:
  what tour, phoenix?
Phoenix:
we're playin ozzfest this summer
mike:
with whom phoenix?
Phoenix:
well, there's a whole bunch of bands actually mike, some of them being black sabbath, as well as marilyn manson, as well as slipknot, as well as papa roach
Mike :
  PAPA ROACH!!!!!, CACA ROACH !!!! ( insert freaky, but adorable, mike voice. clearly mike had some red bull before the interview)
RS :
they're gonna love that one
Mike :
who the broken home boys?
Rs :
You just called them " CACA " , i don't know if they like that
Mike :
They love CACA
Phoenix :
They love us
Mike :
Coby loves being a broken home boy. we toured with them in december, they called us the linkin park rangers and we called them the broken home boys.
(chit chat) - *************PAPERCUT****
(so we come out of the song but they don't know the mic is on and they keep chatting , phoenix says " but you won't say who did it?" which comes into play further on in the interview. then  Phoenix looks at me and goes "wait are we on?"  then we talked about the kid that won the tickets.)
Mike :
Okay so, i have a funny story, i don't know why i was reminded of this this morning, but since you're in radio and it's all about entertaining the people i figured i'd help you out.
RS :
Yah cause i usually have to resort to nudity and that really doesn't work in radio
MIKE & PHOENIX:
No no it doesn't work. no
Mike :
So i'm gonna take the wheel right now and tell you a story The first tour we were on was with a band called the union underground. Phoenix was not with us so this story may be new for him, i think. so the guys from the union underground decided it would be really funny to play pranks on ourselves and the middle band, Systematic. and so , they didn't really do anything to us, but they put LIVe chickens on systematic's stage, and the poor chickens got caught in the lights and were pooping on the drums and stuff, the guitarist couldn't even move anywhere cause there were chickens all over his feet. so we played after systematic and in preparation for our prank - cause we figured if they are gonna pull a prank on us we should pull something on them. and i am not gonna tell you who in our band did this, but it's somebody in our band who wouldn't ever usually do something like this. they're prank was going to be that they were going to defecate into a trash bag, and if anything at all happened to us on stage, taht person in our band was going to throw it on union underground. union underground didn't even know this but i guess word got around that you shouldn't mess with us. They're like "don't mess with that band, you guys listen to me. i heard bad rumors and if you do anything to them you're gonna be in big trouble' and luckily we ended up leaving the bag of feaces.
RS :
what kind of faeces was it though? was it rock hard? diarrhetic?
Mike:
nobody knows, only the person who did it. because they did it, brought out the bag with a big smiling face and everyone else was like WHOA, i can't believe you just did that, first of all. and second, i'm afraid to actually follow through but...
( now i could say that mike looked somewhat guilty during this part of the story but i could be wrong. but let us refer back to their "are we on" conversation  right after we played papercut. tee-hee)
Mike :
oh, but now my story is dying because we went off in a wierd direction.. BUT HEY! here's a question addressed to me. how long have i been playing the guitar. and i've actually been playing the guitar a long time and brad and i write guitar parts together. like we wrote stuff together for the album, but.. this is the first tour that i've actaully played on stage and it's very different, really wierd. if you play guitar at home.. do you play guitar?
RS:
no i don't do anything useful
Phoenix:
we've been running mike through the guitar lesson thing
Mike:
dude it's a whole different animal, holding that thing sitting down, i'm pretty good, but holding that thing standing up it's a lot harder for me to play,  but i'm getting the hang of it.
RS :
do you do that pelvic thrust thing to hold it up?
Mike :
that's the only way to hold it up. you don't understand, like people do that and it's not like a style thing
Phoenix :
it's a neccesity, really
Mike:
yah, it's functional. like the pelvic thrust is functional adaptation
Phoenix:
it's called "going shotgun", that's the technical terminology for that rock and roll move ( mike has a fit of laughter in the background)
Mike :
WORD
RS :
one more question, what's your favorite song on the album I think your fans really like in the end but..
Mike :
i like in the end. I like papercut
Phoenix :
yah i like papercut. i think that's my favorite
RS :
well tahnks to linkinpark for...
MIKE:
( a-la-5 yr old who forgot his g.i. joe in the car and HAS TO go get it right now) WHOA! on more thing , god, i'm so talkative today, what's with me?- ( and discusses the art contest on the website)