The music of Linkin Park has been dealing with topics such as alienation, internal demons and personal suffering for a long time. Which makes the lead singer Chester Bennington’s suicide a particularly tragic and severe loss. Bennington voice often sounded like a struggle between darkness and light, because it suddenly changed rough screaming from delicate, subtle vulnerability.
“The most impressive talent I’ve ever seen live,” wrote Rihanna in an Instagram tribute to Bennington. “A voice!” Here we look back on 12 important songs from the band that made this voice accessible to the world.
“One Step Closer” (2000)
“As far as the text is concerned, it is self-explanatory,” Linkin-Park singer Mike Shinoda 2000 told Billboard. “I think that’s one of the reasons why he is doing so well.” Her debut single already had all the elements that Linkin Park should make a rap rock sensation. Intended guitars. Scratching gymnastics. Partly sung, partly raped fear and a chorus (“Everything You Say to Me/Takes Me One Step Closer to the Edge/and i’M about to break!”), Which spotted the border between vulnerability and anger.
“The song was created at a time when we were in the studio. And our private life and music put us under pressure,” continued Shinoda. “We were at the end of our strength, so to speak.” Years later, Shinoda revealed that the song was about a record producer who wanted to convince Bennington to leave the band and start a solo career.
“Crawling” (2001)
The claustrophobic, bubbling song “Crawling” focuses on Bennington. And it enables him to express the tension described in the unpleasant stanzas with fully bitten teeth. Bennington told that Rolling Stonethat “crawling” and similarly discussed songs were his way of taking stock of the difficult phases of his life.
“It is easy to fall into this trap – ‘I poor, me poor'”, Bennington said 2002. “That’s why songs like ‘Crawling’ come: I can’t stand myself. But this song is about taking responsibility for his actions. I don’t say ‘you’. It’s about that. I myself The reason for this is that I feel that way. There is something in me that pulls me down. “
“PaperCut” (2001)
In one 2013Interview with the radio station Monster Radio RX 93.1 From Manila, Chester Bennington described “Papercut” as “the identity of the band” and as his favorite song by Linkin Park. The explosive opening track of your groundbreaking debut album Hybrid theory set new standards for the metal in the new millennium. “In the beginning it was my goal to bring as much melody into music as possible,” said Bennington. “The band was really, very good in hip-hop. And very good to write rock music. But before I got there, there wasn’t much melody. When we came to this song, the chorus was so cool. And the words behind it were so cool that I didn’t have to do much until we turned it around. It was a lot of fun.
“In the End” (2001)
This thrilling hit from “Hybrid theory“Made it to second place Billboard-Charts. The best placement of the band in the hot 100 of their career. However, Bennington admitted that he was initially not convinced. “I was never a fan of ‘in the End’ and honestly didn’t want it to appear on the album”, the singer told V Music in 2012. “How much I was wrong? But now I love ‘in the end’ and find it a great song.”
“Faint” (2003)
Linkin Parks rousing second single from “Meteora” is about Mike Shinoda’s analysis of a broken relationship. Accompanied by Chester Bennington’s demand: “I can no longer feel like before! / Don’t turn my back / I will not be ignored!” “Faint” combines high -gloss strings and tough riffs to a great result.
“Breaking the Habit” (2004)
“Breaking the Habit” was the fifth single release from her second album ‘Meteora’ from 2003, which avoided the Sophomore Slump with 27 million copies sold worldwide.
“Numb/Encore” with Jay-Z (2004)
In 2004, Linkin Park again bound the boundaries between rap and rock when they gathered with none other than Jay-Z. Originally intended for an MTV special, the project finally led to a Mashup EP entitled “Collision Course”. A collection of six songs that combine Linkin Park songs with various classics of the New York MC.
It became the second EP that ever Billboard 200 reached. And her only single “Numb/Encore” (a new version of the Linkin Park song “Numb” from 2003) was the crowning highlight. Jay’s verses dance over the glitchy beat, and Bennington’s vocals – who passes from tender singing to a hard growling – is the perfect addition. “There was no ego at all when working with Jay,” Mike Shinoda told MTV News About the overall cooperation. “If I asked him to play something in a certain way or to insert a vocal line here or there, he likes to do so.”
“What i’ve Done” (2007)
Linkin Park teamed up with the legendary producer Rick Rubin for her third album “Minutes to Midnight”. The one helped them to leave their nu metal roots behind. The lead single “What i’ve Done” summarized the band’s new approach by moving the focus on Bennington’s singing. And no longer on the interaction between his high voice and Mike Shinoda’s rhymes. The singer moves from vulnerability to despair. And addresses remorse of a threatening, hypnotic piano reef. “We are moving from many of the foreseeable sounds that we have had in the past,” said Bennington in an interview with MTV after the single was published.
“Bleed it out” (2007)
This track from the album “Minutes to Midnight” published in 2007 summarizes Linkin Parks complete disregard of stylistic limits. And changes between rap-like stanzas by Mike Shinoda and Chester Bennington’s melodic rock chores. “When it was finally finished,” Shinoda told the magazine Kerrang! About the song, ‘I said to the band:’ I think nobody could have written a song like this. This is a damn bizarre Death party rap-Hoedown! ‘”
“The Catalyst” (2010)
“We wanted a track that is representative of the album. And shows in which direction it will go. This song was just the right thing,” bass player Dave ‘Phoenix’ Farrell told MTV News The decision of the band “The Catalyst” as the first single from her album ‘a Thousand Sun’s’ published in 2010. ‘It is a risk. But it’s worth it, ‘he said. The song marks a clear break with the sound of the band from the early 2000s. And combines urgent synth pop with an industrial touch that is reminiscent of Nine Inch Nails.
“Burn it down” (2012)
“Burn It Down” begins in a hazard cloud, whose whirring synthesizer finally combines a strongly distorted keyboard melody that reminds of a reversal of the reversal from ‘in the End’ from the year 2000.
The album on which it was introduced, the “Living Things” produced by Rick Rubin, was in a way a return to the roots. Away from the unusual concepts and the cross -genre style of the predecessor “A Thousand Suns” from 2010.
“In the past, we deliberately removed what we did before. But here the energy is clearly similar to ‘Hybrid Theory’,” Bennington 2012 told Rolling Stone. However, the more subtle textures and Bennington’s passionate, but still precisely coordinated singing on “Burn It Down” were a sign of how much the band had grown as a musician since she had stormed into the rock stream of rock almost twelve years earlier.
“Heavy” feat. Kiiara (2017)
“I remember how Chester came in and said, ‘Hey, how are you today?’,” Mike Shinoda told the magazine “Billboard” about the songwriting session, from which this warm, slow pop track from her last album “One More Light” emerged. ‘And he said:’ Oh, I’m fine. ‘ We hung around together for a few minutes. And then he said: ‘Do you know what? I have to be honest. I’m not feeling well. I’m not okay. Too much happens in my life. I feel like under water. ‘”The song, in which Bennington takes over the vocal part with the pop singer Kiiara, reached 50th on the hot 100.