New Album (2009–2010)

In October 2008 Shinoda revealed on his blog that he, Phoenix and Hahn had begun working on two song ideas at Hahn's home, with studio recording to begin in earnest soon. In 2008, Bennington announced that Linkin Park's fourth studio release will be a concept album. In an interview with MTV in November 2008, Bennington stated, "It sounds a little daunting to me, so, I think my confidence level will drop, but when it was presented to us by this friend of ours, we liked the idea. It was an inspiring idea, and it was something we could relate a lot of the things we like to write about to". He also added that the band planned to begin recording in December for a six-week session. The album was expected in mid 2009, but in late March, Mike Shinoda wrote on his blog saying "We're hoping to have Chester's Dead By Sunrise album out this fall, and the new LP album out early next year."

In May 2009, Linkin Park announced that they were working on their fourth album which will be released in 2010, with the aim for it to be "genre-busting". Shinoda also stated recently in an interview with IGN that the new album will have in comparison to Minutes to Midnight a bigger "thread of consistency" and will also be more experimental and "hopefully more cutting-edge". Additionally the band's other vocalist Chester Bennington confirmed in an interview with Taipei Times that Rick Rubin returns as the producer of the new album. Both band members mentioned in their interviews respectively that sampling and electronic beats will play a very important role in the new album's sound.