Music Matters

The influencers: Linkin Park plays with the heart of a thousand angry copycats

There is little the city of Houston could have hoped for to officially kickoff the non-Rodeo 2011 concert season than Thursday night's rescheduled Linkin Park show at the Toyota Center (the band cancelled a February Toyota date due to illness).

(OK, it isn't exactly the the "official" kickoff of the season since Ozzy Osbourne played the Toyota Center early this year, but who are we kidding? These days an Ozzy show is a cross between senior center theater and a puppet show. No?)

If there is a band that has been more successful than Linkin Park over its first decade of recording in recent years, I couldn't find it. Since debuting with Hybrid Theory in 2000, which raced to No. 2 on the Billboard 200 album charts, the group's following three albums of rap-metal fusion all topped the charts. That includes the Linkin Park's most recent release, A Thousand Suns, which also produced two No. 1 alternative rock singles — "The Catalyst" and "Waiting For The End — over the last six months.

The numbers don't stop there. Link Park has sold over 50 million albums courtesy of angry anthem generation-defining songs like "Numb," 'What I've Done," and "New Divide."

The best part is that the band, led by the soothing vocals of Chester Bennington juxtaposed with the bristling rap screams of Mike Shinoda, has done all this while carving out a genre that they virtually own the monopoly on. The mating of rap and rock was played with in the 1990s by bands like Limp Bizkit and Korn. In the end, both of those were still rock bands first.

Linkin Park is the first to weave a true symbiosis of the two genres into their songs. Take one element away and the songs don't stand up. It's truly an art form.

But the main reason that I know that Linkin Park is one of the biggest bands on the planet right now is the mimicry from their adolescent fans. I was judge at a local band challenge at the House of Blues a couple weeks ago and no less than two of the six acts on the bill were taking their cues from Linkin Park and the rap-rock movement.

That, my friends, is influence in action.

Linkin Park, 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Toyota Center

Tickets: $42.50-$72.50

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In the spotlight

Houston reels in new rank among 10 best cities for filmmakers in 2026

Photo by Kyle Loftus on Unsplash

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Houston has just snapped up new recognition as the No. 10 best place to live and work as a filmmaker in North America, according to MovieMaker Magazine's annual report, "The Best Places to Live and Work as a Moviemaker in 2026."

The Bayou City has made improvements after ranking 12th in the magazine's 2025 list.

The annual list ranks the best cities in the U.S. and Canada for individuals to live while working in the film industry, based on production spending, tax incentives, cost of living, the prevalence of "local film scenes," and additional factors. The list is divided into two categories: 25 big cities and 10 smaller cities or towns.

The spotlighted cities are the places where the publication believes filmmakers "have the best chance of both succeeding in the famously difficult entertainment industry, and making [their] own art."

For up-and-coming filmmakers that want to live in Texas, MovieMaker says doing it in Houston is "more sustainable than ever" thanks to incentives like the Texas Moving Image Industry Incentive Program, which increased its production grant rebate from 22.5 percent to up to 31 percent for qualified in-state spending. The report also said Houston has an "arms-wide-open" approach for filmmakers.

"As the biggest city in Texas, and fourth biggest city in America, Houston has nearly every type of location, from cityscapes to piney woods to rolling hills to nearby farmland," the report said. "It’s close to Galveston Island and the Gulf of Mexico, and car commercials love the absence of billboard advertising."

MovieMaker also highlighted Houston's diversity, its low cost of living compared to the national average, and its local festivals like the Houston Cinema Arts Festival and Houston Latino Film Festival.

"The city has enough film crew for two to three sizable features, and recent shoots have included the thrillers Eleven Days, with Taylor Kitsch, and A Love, from director Courtney Glaude, Tyler Perry Studios’ executive creator of Scripted and Unscripted," the report said. "Houston is also notable for a strong contingent of films with budgets under $1 million."

Elsewhere in Texas, Austin ranked as the No. 5 best place to live and work as a filmmaker in North America. Dallas ranked seventh, while neighboring Fort Worth ranked 12th. San Antonio appeared as No. 14, and El Paso landed 25th on the list.

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