The Bravery took the stage at 7:00. They played a relatively basic, no-frills set, reminiscent of last year’s third-to-last band, Taking Back Sunday. The Bravery’s banner, a simple one portraying a sun and their band name, soaked in the last beams of sunlight during “Honest Mistake." The Bravery finished with “Swollen Summer."

With the moon out and an appreciative dip in temperature, the amphitheater began to fill up and look a little more like a rock show. A little before 8:00, Chris Cornell’s band started playing, but Chris was nowhere to be found during this impressive 5 minute band-jam. Then, to a thunderous applause, “Well I been watchin’… while you been coughin’… I’ve been drinking life… while you been nauseous.” For anyone who wondered whether Chris would dip into songs from his Audioslave days, the answer was a resounding yes. Not only that, his twelve song set was interwoven with songs from his solo career and his years spent as part of Audioslave, Soundgarden, and Temple of the Dog. For a set that could have finished a distant second to Linkin Park’s finale, his performance was near-epic.

Chris performed “Hunger Strike” halfway through his set and when he belted, “But I’m goin’ hungry” it was returned with “I’m goin’ hungry… I’m goin’ hungry… I’m goin’ hungry” and out walked none other than Linkin Park’s Chester Bennington. Chester walked to within a few feet of Chris and the two looked at each other and exchanged that line for the remainder of the song. It drove the audience wild, and it was perhaps the standout moment of the entire festival. Chester walked back off stage to a standing ovation. Feeding off that energy, Chris then performed “Watch Out” from his new album produced by Timbaland, due out in September. After back-to-back Audioslave songs from his self-entitled 2002 album and another brand new song, Chris spoke to the audience. He said that he had put out five songs to a text message vote and that he’d play the winner next. The winner was “Blow Up the Outside World,” a Soundgarden song that Chris said hadn’t been played with a full band live in over 10 years. As he hurried off the stage unexpectedly, the standing ovation lasted for nearly 5 minutes after he had departed.

Needing to live up to the sets of their predecessors, Linkin Park brought their game on this night. Street Drum Corps came out and provided a Blue Man Group-esque drum intro. Then, in near darkness, one could barely make out the six faint figures of Linkin Park as they walked on stage. The drum beats continued and then, suddenly gave way to the unforgettable guitar chords of “One Step Closer.” Anticipation grew and then a head-bobbing Chester started the first verse as the thousands of fans in attendance sang along. The star-struck audience of nearly 15,000 didn’t sit in their seats from then on, and the energy from the opening moments of the set didn’t lull even the slightest.

Linkin Park slammed into “Lying From You” and continued to mix in singles from ‘Hybrid Theory’ and ‘Meteora’ along with new songs from ‘Minutes to Midnight.’ After performing “Papercut,” the first song off their debut album, Mike Shinoda took the mic and started rapping, with at least one verse from his side project Fort Minor’s song, “Petrified.” This broke into a short, purely instrumental bit that featured fro-growing, headphone-wearing, matrix-entering guitarist Brad Delson in the spotlight. This segued into “Given Up.”

Nearly midway through their performance, the cool and collected Mike Shinoda addressed the crowd and thanked them for all their support. He thanked the crowd for coming out and watching the earlier bands perform, because as he said, “We were in the same position as those bands a few years back, playing first or second at a show.” Shinoda then started on the keyboard for “Leave Out All the Rest,” for which Linkin Park recently released a music video.

1  2   |  Next Page »