Live Review: Linkin Park @ Brisbane Entertainment Centre

Linkin Park returns to Australia for their From Zero World Tour, 13 years after they last performed Down Under.

Linkin Park lit up Brisbane Entertainment Centre last night with their From Zero World Tour, their first Australian tour since 2013. The first of seven shows in the Australian leg of the tour was an unbelievable feat of production, effects, and sound, proving that Linkin Park still holds their crown as rock royalty.

Since their Living Things World Tour in 2013, the band has undergone many changes, with the most significant being the loss of Chester Bennington in 2017. After a seven-year hiatus, the group returned to music.

Dead Sara vocalist Emily Armstrong began recording and writing with Linkin Park in 2019, and the new group released their first studio album together, From Zero, in 2024. Armstrong more than proved her rock chops last night, easily transitioning from haunting vocals to all-out screams as the set list demanded.

World tours from long-serving global bands always turn out a mixed audience, and Linkin Park was no exception. With a demographic encompassing Gen X through to Gen Z, the all-ages show binds its punters in black and excitement. When entering the Entertainment Centre, a giant countdown clock on the screen added to the anticipation. A rhythmed clapping started at the 1:30 mark, and when there were only 10 seconds left, the audience cried out the countdown to 0.

Somewhere I Belong starts to play, given away by the iconic record scratching. The crowd surges in approval, and the show is on, and it does feel as though I am reminded by the big feelings that we unknowingly attach to music as big and complicated as that of Linkin Park’s catalogue.

From where we sit, we see two young women run down the steps in the seated area, jump over the railing, and try to bury themselves in the mosh pit. The security guards quickly apprehend them, but it’s this passion and excitement that you can feel around the room from start to finish.

After their opening track, Mike Shinoda spoke to the audience, “It’s been a long time since we have been back here. And we appreciate you all sticking with us through that. Thanks so much for the support on the new music, the new cycle, and new friends. You guys keep us going.”

The show is broken into four acts and an encore, with a total of 27 tracks played to an audience that has waited a long time to see the LA-native group. At the start of each new act, there is intro/transition music which also bleeds into their hits, and the whole show feels immaculately choreographed.

Encouraging some audience action, Shinoda and Armstrong actually told punters in the moshpit to separate and create an open circle so that they could all flood in and jump as the song takes off in Crawling.

Another standout performance was The Emptiness Machine, a pacey, rock-fuelled hit that was the first song Linkin Park released with their new line-up in 2024 and very much signified their new identity at the time. The stage and screen were transformed into a pink lava-looking illusion that matched the many shirts worn by punters at the show.

Shinoda, one of the founding members, is very much the band’s frontman, whereas Bennington commanded that role of intrigue in a previous era. Shinoda took his time connecting with the audience and even came down from the stage to greet those in the front row, saying, “I can’t see you, let me get closer.”

The screen on stage showed Shinoda shaking hands, signing autographs, and asking punters where they were from. Reading a handmade sign from Brazilian fans requesting that he draw something for them to tattoo on themselves, he did a quick drawing and showed it to them, and the crowd immediately laughed.

He then took more time with his drawing or message and then handed it back to them. Shinoda also found a young man wearing the same hat as him, and told them that the hat he was wearing was actually signed by the whole band if he wanted to swap. This elicited plenty of cheers, and Shinoda moved on to see and talk to other fans.

Shinoda, telling the audience he was keen to try something different at every show, stood on the railing, held his hands out to be supported by his fans, and started a freestyle rap. And unbelievable skill, and was interrupted only by cries of devotion like, “Brisbane loves you, Linkin Park.”

At one point, Shinoda sat on the stage and asked for a show of hands of who had seen Linkin Park live before and who had not. He also asked if there were any Fort Minor fans in the crowd, which there were, and he played a cover of his own song Where’d You Go with Armstrong, the perfect accompanying vocal.

The encore was Papercut, In the End, and Faint, and by this point, the entire centre was on their feet and rocking out to a band that had undeniably shaped their youth. So much emotion was held in the air at the show, and Linkin Park felt like they really held it there with us, appreciative that we had all stuck around to see another world tour.

Presented by Live Nation and Triple M