Linkin Park

Linkin Park (pronounced: [ˈlɪŋkɪn pɑrk]) is an American metal and nu metal band from Agoura Hills, California. Since 2023 it has comprised Mike Shinoda (vocals, rap, guitar, keyboards); Emily Armstrong (vocals); Brad Delson (guitar); Joe Hahn (scratches, keyboards); Dave Farrell (bass) and Colin Brittain (drums,

guitar).

The band was catapulted to the forefront of the global stage with the release of its debut album, Hybrid Theory, in 2000. Having sold more than 24 million copies and certified Diamond by the RIAA, it is one of the best-selling albums in the world and remains the band's most commercially successful release to date. Reanimation is the remix album of Hybrid Theory, released in 2002. In 2003, the release of the album Meteora (also sold in excess of 20 million copies), followed by the CD/DVD Live in Texas and the mash-up EP Collision Course with Jay-Z in 2004, consolidated their status as a flagship band. Feeling they had explored every direction that nu metal and rapcore had to offer, the band chose to turn to other genres on its next album, Minutes to Midnight (2007), which topped the charts in 32 countries, driven in particular by the hits Given Up, Leave Out All the Rest, Shadow of the Day, Bleed It Out and the Transformers soundtrack song What I've Done, and placed as the year's best chart debut in the United States.

Despite unsettling some of their audience, they pushed their experimentation further with the concept album A Thousand Suns, released in 2010 and recognised by some critics as a major work of experimental rock. While they moved closer to electronic rock with Living Things in 2012, notably with Burn It Down and Castle of Glass, their album The Hunting Party, released in June 2014, departed radically from its predecessors with a far rawer and more aggressive sound. One More Light, released on 19 May 2017, is the band's seventh and final studio album with Chester Bennington as lead vocalist, before his death on 20 July 2017. It is the most pop album in the band's discography. This new artistic direction, which surprised many longtime fans, was fully embraced by Chester Bennington, who opened up as never before in the lyrics of the songs. The track Nobody Can Save Me also appears, after his death, to carry a weighty significance for some observers.

Singles such as Crawling, In the End, Papercut and One Step Closer (2000-2001), From the Inside, Somewhere I Belong, Breaking the Habit, Faint and Numb (2003-2004), What I've Done, Shadow of the Day, Given Up, Leave Out All the Rest and Bleed It Out (2007-2008), New Divide (2009), The Catalyst, Waiting for the End, Burning in the Skies and Iridescent (2010-2011), Lost in the Echo, Burn It Down and Castle of Glass (2012), and Final Masquerade and Until It's Gone (2014) helped popularise the band. The band has also collaborated with several artists, notably rapper Jay-Z on the album Collision Course, released in 2004, and with a number of others on the remix albums Reanimation (2002) and Recharged (Album Remix of Living Things) (2013). The group has also released various live CDs and DVDs, including Road to Revolution: Live at Milton Keynes in 2008.

Active on social media, Linkin Park became the first rock band to reach one billion views on the video-hosting site YouTube in 2014.