Chester Bennington

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Chester Bennington was an American singer and songwriter, born in 1976 in Phoenix, Arizona. From a young age he listened to Depeche Mode and Stone Temple Pilots. His childhood was hard: he was abused for years, his parents divorced and he took to drink and drugs early on. To comfort himself he drew and wrote poems and songs. His first serious band was the post-grunge group Grey Daze, with which he recorded two albums in the 1990s.

Music and breakthrough

In 1999 he auditioned for a group from Los Angeles that was then still called Xero and later Linkin Park. He became the main singer, alongside Mike Shinoda, who rapped more. The debut album Hybrid Theory from 2000 was a worldwide success, with songs such as Crawling and In the End. Meteora from 2003 and Minutes to Midnight from 2007 followed, among others. Linkin Park blended heavy guitars with hip hop, samples and electronics, the style now called nu metal.

Influence

Bennington had a high, emotional voice that could switch in a single song from soft singing to raw screaming. His lyrics were often about pain, doubt and addiction. Besides Linkin Park he sang in Dead by Sunrise and for a time with his childhood heroes Stone Temple Pilots. He struggled with depression and addiction all his life and died in 2017. One critic wrote that he made nu metal universal.

Listening

Discography

Studio albums

• 2014MALL: Music From the Motion Picture (soundtrack)

In School of Rock

The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.

• Mixtape 4: When Rock Was Still Pop^NL Reader

Mentioned in other articles

• Nu metal GenreLinkin Park of Los Angeles had two vocalists: Chester Bennington sang and screamed, Mike Shinoda rapped.
• Numb SongThe singer Chester Bennington sang and screamed, and Mike Shinoda rapped and made beats.

See also

• Numb