Chester Charles Bennington

          Chester Charles Bennington (born March 20, 1976) is an American musician, singer-songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. He is the lead vocalist in the Grammy Award winning rock band Linkin Park and Dead by Sunrise, he was previously associated with the band Grey Daze, among others.

 As of 2009 Bennington has released three studio albums with Linkin Park and released his debut album with Dead by Sunrise in 2009. Bennington's first release with Linkin Park, Hybrid Theory, was a commercial success, and he has released several major albums and singles since then. In 2007, Bennington was placed at 46th on Hit Parader's list of "Heavy Metal's All-Time Top 100 Vocalists"


         Bennington was born in Phoenix, Arizona.^[2] He took interest in music at a young age, citingDepeche Mode and Stone Temple Pilots as early inspirations. Bennington's parents separated in the late 1980s. He later struggled with cocaine and methamphetamine addictions.^[2] Bennington eventually overcame his drug addiction, and would go on to denounce drug use in future interviews.^[3] He worked at a Burger King restaurant before starting his career as a professional musician.^[2]

Before joining Linkin Park, Bennington was a vocalist in Grey Daze, a post-grunge band fromPhoenix, Arizona.^[4] He left Grey Daze in 1998, but struggled to find another band to play in.^[4] After nearly quitting his musical career altogether, Jeff Blue, the vice president of A&R at Zomba Music in Los Angeles, offered Bennington an audition with the future members of Linkin Park.^[4] Bennington quit his day job, and took his family to California, where he had a successful audition with Linkin Park, who were then called "Xero".^[4] Bennington and Mike Shinoda, the band’s other vocalist, made significant progress together, but failed to find a record deal.^[4] After facing numerous rejections, Jeff Blue, now a vice president of A&R at Warner Bros., intervened again to help the band sign withWarner Bros. Records