Chester Bennington^†

Forty-four labels passed on Linkin Park before Warner signed them, and he almost didn't audition at all. He left his own birthday party early to record the demo tape for the band. Hybrid Theory came out in 2000 and eventually went Diamond, part of a catalog that moved 70 million copies worldwide. That voice was the mechanism: the New York Times called him able to 'pair serrated rawness with sleek melody.' He didn't just scream. He used the scream as punctuation, alternating with a melodic ache that gave a generation of suburban teenagers somewhere to put their damage.

One More Light, released two months before he died, was Linkin Park's most divisive record. Fans who wanted the band to stay heavy felt like he'd sold them out. He never got to find out whether that pivot would have worked long-term. His catalog keeps finding new audiences partly because the emotional register he worked in (anxiety, shame, survival) hasn't gone out of fashion.

Dead by Sunrise, his side project, got its name from his own description of what his life looked like during recording: he reportedly never saw the sun due to how much he was drinking. He'd been dealing with addiction since his teens, having survived childhood sexual abuse from ages 7 to 13 that he didn't discuss publicly for years. What made him distinctive was that he didn't hide any of it. He put it into lyrics, and 'Crawling' won a Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance in 2002 partly because so many people recognized themselves in it.

He died on what would have been Chris Cornell's 53rd birthday, two months after Cornell died by suicide. A tribute concert at the Hollywood Bowl in October 2017 drew members of Korn, System of a Down, Blink-182, and Avenged Sevenfold. Linkin Park went silent as a live act until 2024, when they reformed with a new vocalist. His bandmates established the One More Light Fund to support suicide prevention and mental health resources.