Linkin Park Previews Unreleased Song "Friendly Fire," Hints at More Coming Soon

Over the past week, Linkin Park has been setting up quite a mystery for fans to solve. Almost exactly a year after releasing "Lost" from the Meteora vault, the band is teasing something new, leaving clues in the form of little green dots hidden across their digital footprint.

One part of that mystery is now solved with the reveal of a previously unreleased track "Friendly Fire." The band has shared a 30-second preview of the song, originally recorded during the 2017 One More Light sessions, across their social media accounts alongside the number 20. Although Mike Shinoda has previously spoken about how much he liked the song, and the title appeared in the background of studio photos from the One More Light era, this is the first opportunity to hear it. The full song will be released on February 23, with a longer preview available for listening on SoundCloud.

But let's back up. What’s going on with these green dots? The first hint that there was something afoot came on February 10th, when fans noticed that LP accounts were reposting some of the band’s biggest singles. At this point, there was nothing concrete, but the surge in activity caught people’s attention and rumors started flying.

Next, beginning on the 14th, green dots began appearing in the thumbnails of some of their music videos

Although some theorized that the dots could indicate videos that had been remastered into higher quality, that idea was quickly discarded when the next update hit- the Spotify visualizers for these songs were replaced with simple graphics, just a number centered on a green background.

Rumors coalesced into a theory that the numbers are the tracklist of an upcoming Linkin Park greatest hits album, although as yet there is no official word.

The cryptic greenposting continued over on the official Linkin Park Instagram, although the slideshow of black and white music video clips and album covers didn't provide any more clarity, conspicuously leaving a blank space where the identity of number 14 would have been revealed if the pattern held.

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With the reveal of "Friendly Fire" as number 20, we're still left with questions. Why now? Why green? Why skip 14? The missing track 14 could be anything, from another previously unreleased song from the vault, an accidental oversight (although that seems unlikely given LP's consistent, meticulous attention to detail,) or perhaps something fans haven't managed to find yet. There is one more unreleased song visible in the  One More Light photos, "Out of Reach" that seems like a likely candidate.

The "tracklist" clocks in at 1 hr 2 min with two missing songs, and as it currently stands is:

1. "Crawling"
2. "Faint"
3. "Numb/Encore"
4. "Papercut"
5. "Breaking the Habit"
6. "In the End
7. "Bleed it Out"
8. "Somewhere I Belong"
9. "Waiting for the End
10. "Castle of Glass
11. "One More Light"
12. "Burn It Down"
13 "What I’ve Done"
14. UNKNOWN
15. "One Step Closer"
16. "New Divide"
17. "Leave Out All the Rest"
18. "Lost"
19. "Numb"
20. "Friendly Fire"

The idea of a greatest hits album is far from a unanimous consensus, with fans spinning up theories ranging from a Fortnite Festival release to a collection of "Already Over" mashups.