Chester with blonde hair
Chester Charles Bennington (March 20, 1976 - July 20, 2017) was an American musician, best known as the longtime lead vocalist, frontman and songwriter of American rock band Linkin Park. Born in Phoenix, Arizona, his mother was a nurse and his father was a policeman who worked to stop sexual abuse to children. He loved music and sung from the time he was a little boy and was a fan of The Misfits. When he was just 7 years old, an older male betrayed him by sexually abusing him and the abuse lasted for 6 years til he was 13 due to his fear to ask for help. He eventually revealed the abuser to his father, though chose not to press charges, most likely cause his abuser was a victim himself. He lived with his father from age 11-17 when he moved in with his mother, who kept him in the house when she discovered he did drugs. He worked at Burger King before becoming a famous pro musician. When Bennington near quit music as a career, he left his own birthday party early to successfully win his place as a member of Linkin Park. He and Mike Shinoda's vocals as singer and rapper respectively was crucial to their music when Chester rose them to fame with their debut album, Hybrid Theory and continued their success with their next album Meteora. In 2005, Bennington founded Dead by Sunrise a year post Shinoda forming his own side project Fort Minor, which put their 3rd and less successful album, Minutes to midnight on hold. Bandmate and lead guitarist Brad Delson became a backing vocalist on their 4th album, A Thousand Suns, which was a larger success than their previous album and took new styles in music for the band. Their 5th album Living Things was also a huge success and the lead sing ""Burn it down"" sold millions of copies. Their 6th album The Hunting Party was their last successful album as their 7th, One More Light, was criticized due to replacing their rock style with mostly pop, drummer Rob Bourdon's decrease in drumming and Shinoda's decrease in vocals etc. Bennington Did not react well to the negative reviews and his last concert was July 6, 2017. 2 Weeks later, he hung himself and the band was forced to close the rest of the One More Light tour. Bassist Phoenix and Shinoda commented on their friend and lead singer's suicide on the tragic day and DJ Mr Hahn expressed his condolences shortly later. Mike has dedicated his solo album Post Traumatic to Chester and has performed with Phoenix and Mr Hahn, alongside a tribute concert to Chester in late October 2017.