"Burning in the Skies" is a song by American

rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...

band Linkin Park. It was announced as the band's third single from their fourth studio album, '' A Thousand Suns'', on January 20, 2011, and it was released on March 21. A music video for the single was directed by

Joe Hahn Joseph Hahn (born March 15, 1977) is an American musician, DJ, director and visual artist best known as the DJ of the American rock band Linkin Park, doing the scratching, turntables, sampling, and programming for all seven of Linkin Park's ...

, Linkin Park's

turntablist Turntablism is the art of manipulating sounds and creating new music, sound effects, mixes and other creative sounds and beats, typically by using two or more turntables and a cross fader-equipped DJ mixer. The mixer is plugged into a PA sys ...

. It was released in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

to the

Nielsen BDS Broadcast Data Systems (also known as BDS or Luminate BDS), is a service that tracks radio, television and internet airplay of songs. The service, which is a unit of MRC Data, is a contributing factor to North American charts published by co-owned ...

adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quie ...

indicator chart by February 2011, although it was clarified by vocalist

Mike Shinoda Michael Kenji Shinoda (; ja, 篠田賢治, Shinoda Kenji; born February 11, 1977) is an American musician, singer, rapper, songwriter and record producer. He co-founded the rock band Linkin Park in 1996 and was the band's collaborative vocal ...

that it is an international-only single, hence not charting in any '' Billboard'' charts. "Burning in the Skies" (along with five other songs from ''A Thousand Suns'') is featured in the "Linkin Park Track Pack" as

downloadable content Downloadable content (DLC) is additional content created for an already released video game, distributed through the Internet by the game's publisher. It can either be added for no extra cost or it can be a form of video game monetization, enabli ...

for the rhythm video game '' Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock''. The track pack was released on October 19, 2010.

Music video

Filming for the music video occurred from January 17 through 19, 2011, with

and lead vocalist

tweeting about filming the video. The international music video was directed by Joe Hahn. The video premiered on kerrang.com on February 22. The video was also uploaded on

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

by Linkin Park on their official YouTube channel linkinparktv. The entire video is in slow motion. It shows the final activities of random people (a teen party; a couple in a car; a girl in her bathroom; another girl studying with her computer; an old man dining alone; and a kid running with pajamas and a lion mask) before being caught in a

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of what seems to be a

nuclear explosion A nuclear explosion is an explosion that occurs as a result of the rapid release of energy from a high-speed nuclear reaction. The driving reaction may be nuclear fission or nuclear fusion or a multi-stage cascading combination of the two, tho ...

in downtown

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. The explosion happens when the guitar solo starts. Then the band members are seen in darkness with effects similar to the ones used in the " Waiting for the End" music video, although they do not sing or perform their instruments in accordance to the song. As of October 2022, the music video for "Burning in the Skies" has over 55 million views on

. The behind-the-scenes video for "Burning in the Skies" was released on March 29, 2011.

Live performances

The song made its debut full live performance at their Melbourne, Australia show on December 13, 2010 during their

A Thousand Suns World Tour A Thousand Suns World Tour was the worldwide sixth concert tour by American rock band Linkin Park. The tour supported the band's fourth studio album '' A Thousand Suns''. The tour ranked 35th in Pollstar's "Top 50 Worldwide Tour (Mid-Year)", ea ...

as the chorus had been sung by

and

Chester Bennington Chester Charles Bennington (March 20, 1976 – July 20, 2017) was an American singer and songwriter who was best known as the lead vocalist of rock band Linkin Park. He was also the lead vocalist of the bands Grey Daze, Dead by Sunrise, ...

after the bridge of " Bleed It Out" in several shows of the tour.

Reception

Jean Dean Wells of

AOL Radio AOL Radio powered by Slacker (formerly AOL Radio powered by CBS Radio, and prior AOL Radio featuring XM) was an online radio service available in the United States only. It had over 200 free internet radio stations. History Roots AOL Radio ...

praised the song, saying that the band "delivered an upbeat track that could play just as easily on any pop radio station."

Track listing

Personnel

– vocals *

– lead vocals, sampler,

lead guitar Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featu ...

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keybo ...

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* Brad Delson – rhythm guitar * Dave "Phoenix" Farrell –

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

, backing vocals *

– turntables, samplers *

Rob Bourdon Robert Gregory Bourdon (born January 20, 1979) is an American musician, best known as the drummer and co-founding member of the American rock band Linkin Park. Early life Bourdon was born in Calabasas, California. He received classical piano l ...

– drums, percussion

Commercial performance

Since Shinoda confirmed that it is an international-only single, the single did not chart on any '' Billboard'' charts aside from debuting on the

Rock Digital Song Sales The ''Billboard'' charts tabulate the relative weekly popularity of songs and albums in the United States and elsewhere. The results are published in ''Billboard'' magazine. ''Billboard'' biz, the online extension of the ''Billboard'' charts, pr ...

chart for a solitary week at 37 solely on the strength of digital downloads of the song following the release of ''A Thousand Suns''. The single received moderate success on the charts where it charted. It peaked within the Top 40 on the Austrian, German Airplay, and Portuguese charts, while it was a Top 20 hit on the UK Rock & Metal Chart peaking at number 16 and staying on the UK Rock & Metal charts for two weeks.

Charts

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Burning In The Skies Linkin Park songs 2010 songs 2011 singles Anti-war songs Protest songs Songs written by Mike Shinoda Rock ballads Warner Records singles Song recordings produced by Rick Rubin Electronic rock songs