"Crawling" and "In the End" were massive radio hits the latter song even topped the U.S. Linkin Park titled their debut album Hybrid Theory, a tribute to the band's past, and released the record during the fall of 2000. vice-president Jeff Blue, the band entered the studio with Don Gilmore shortly thereafter to record what would become a diamond-certified worldwide smash. and chose a new name: Linkin Park, a misspelled reference to Lincoln Park in Santa Monica. Still struggling to find an audience, they finally caught the attention of Warner Bros. When replacement singer Chester Bennington climbed aboard in 1998 - sharing vocal duties with Shinoda in what would become a crucial part of their signature sound - they rebranded as Hybrid Theory and issued an eponymous EP. Few companies expressed interest in Xero's self-titled demo tape, however, prompting Wakefield to leave the lineup (he would later resurface as the manager for Taproot). Bassist Dave "Phoenix" Farrell, singer Mark Wakefield, and DJ/art student Joseph Hahn joined soon after, and the band courted various labels while playing hometown shows in Los Angeles. Months after the release of their seventh and final album as the founding lineup, frontman Chester Bennington passed away, closing the book on a nearly two-decade run that included five chart-topping albums and tens of millions of records sold across the globe.ĭrummer Rob Bourdon, guitarist Brad Delson, and MC/vocalist Mike Shinoda attended high school in Southern California, where they formed the rap-rock band Xero in 1996.
From the commercial peak of their hip-hop-influenced, multi-platinum breakthrough albums Hybrid Theory (2000) and Meteora (2003), into a brief electronic phase (2010's A Thousand Suns), and ultimately to their final pop moment (2017's One More Light), they stayed ahead of the curve without sacrificing heaviness or chart success. No matter their direction, pain and catharsis remained at their core. Indeed, as their original band name and debut album title suggested, they were a hybrid of forces, relying as much on the vocal interplay between singer Chester Bennington and rapper Mike Shinoda as on the band's muscled instrumentation, which layered DJ Hahn's effects atop heavy, processed guitars and pounding percussion.
Despite being burdened with the oft-derided nu-metal and rap-rock genre designations, they soon evolved beyond those associations into a more complex beast. Rooted at the crossroads of aggressive metal and beat-driven hip-hop, Linkin Park became one of the most successful acts of the early 21st century by incorporating elements from across genres, injecting hardcore rap, raucous punk, atmospheric electronic, and even polished pop stylings into their music.
0 kommentar(er)
