Mike Shinoda
Mike Shinoda
Michael Kenji "Mike" Shinodais an American musician, rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer, graphic designer, manager and film composer. He co-founded Linkin Park in 1996 and is the band's rhythm guitarist, songwriter, keyboardist, and co-vocalist. Shinoda later created a hip hop-driven side project, Fort Minor, in 2004. He served as a producer for tracks and albums by Lupe Fiasco, Styles of Beyond, and The X-Ecutioners...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionGuitarist
Date of Birth11 February 1977
CityAgora Hills, CA
CountryUnited States of America
I would have never done this record if I didn't have the blessing of the rest of the guys, ... We're not, like, on hiatus. We're working. We're very serious about our records, and I know the guys are at home right now writing. Hopefully we are looking at next year for a record.
I spent ten years playing classical piano, and that was what led to keyboards and eventually to production and to Linkin Park.
I was a producer and rapper before Linkin Park. Once the band took off, it was the center of my focus. A couple of years ago, I started missing doing straight-up hip hop, and that's when Fort Minor began.
global warming. every day i leave my house and think, "was it this hot last year?" the heat this summer here in LA and in most of the US has been unbearable. i can't remember another time when it was 105 degrees fahrenheit out here (40.5 celsius), and that's the kind of weather we've been having pretty much every day.
My parents still treat Christmas like I'm thirteen years old.
I'd call it an organic hip-hop style, musically. Back in the late '80s and early '90s, people sampled a lot, and because of that these records had a feel. They weren't recorded in a computer with a click track. . . . When I was approaching this record, what I wanted to do was try and get back to that, but I write music, I play music, so I wanted to write every note, record every note and play every note, and get that kind of hand-played feel.
Since this record is coming out on Machine Shop, our label, I could pick anyone I wanted to work on it, so I chose Brad as our A&R guy, which is hilarious because ... Brad's not a label guy, he's my friend, ... I've known him since I was like 13 years old and he can come in and say, 'Hey, that song, it's good, but trash this part of it and do this differently,' and I will actually listen to him.
The album comes out November 22 one-one two-two, so it's easy to remember.
It's called Fort Minor instead of my name because there is a bunch of other people involved in the project. But I only wanted to work with family and friends; people who I feel are really close to me and we see eye-to-eye. Besides that, Fort has a militant meaning and Minor in music is a smaller, darker, sadder note, so the name is a reflection of the music.
It's a hip-hop record, but it's a musician-based hip-hop record,
Most of the musicians that I know almost to the man everybody uses Apple computers. They've thought of the steps that you're going to think of when you're trying to create your thing. And that's where the tools get invented to make better art.
The thing is, there are so many different ways to make music these days with virtual instruments, software applications, physical instruments, and computer programs.
Little pieces of advice like that can provide us with months' worth of entertainment.
We have people in the band who don't drink or do drugs... some of us like to go sightseeing.