Linkin Park hails from Agoura Hills, California, and was formed in 1996. Linkin Park quickly exploded on the rock scene with the release of their debut studio album Hybrid Theory in 2000. The album was certified Diamond (10 million) on January 7, 2005. As of September 2020, Hybrid Theory has gone 12 times platinum with sales of over 12 million in the US and 30 million copies worldwide. The album features the hit singles “One Step Closer,” “Crawling,” and “In The End,” all of which topped the Rock Charts with “In The End” having crossover success to the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
Their second album, Meteora (2003), continued the band’s success with the singles “Lying From You,” “Numb,” “Somewhere I Belong,” and “Breaking The Habit.” LP’s third album Minutes to Midnight (2007) helped them become one of the most successful and popular rock bands with the singles “Bleed It Out,” “Given Up,” and “What I’ve Done.”
Linkin Park continued to top the rock charts with their albums A Thousand Suns (2010), Living Things (2012), and The Hunting Party (2014). Their seventh and final album, One More Light was released in May of 2017 and was the first time the band began to explore a more pop-oriented sound. Less than 2 months after its release, Linkin Park frontman Chester Bennington died by suicide on July 20, 2017. At that time, Linkin Park went on an indefinite hiatus. In April of 2022, Linkin Park MC Mike Shinoda revealed the band was neither working on new music nor planning on touring for the foreseeable future.
Linkin Park is one of the best-selling and most recognized bands of the 21st century. They are also one of the world’s best-selling artists with over 100 million records sold worldwide. The band won two Grammy Awards, six American Music Awards, two Billboard Music Awards, four MTV Video Music Awards, 10 MTV Europe Music Awards, and three World Music Awards.
Fun Fact: Linkin Park is the first rock band to surpass 1 billion views on YouTube. They are also the only band to have 2 songs that appear in the top 10 of the Spotify “timeless songs” playlist.