Chester LP Songs

[Geki]

What songs did Chester come up with throughout all 7 LP albums? We know he came up with the original idea for SIB. Other ones that come to mind are SOTD (he came up with it) as well as Heavy and Halfway Right on OML being the two songs on the album he has writing credits for. According to Chester, Mike also asked him if he had any punk songs laying around for THP and Chester went home in one night and came back with War. Any others? Did he write The Messenger too?

[xxHybridXeroxx]

I'd be interested in knowing too! Didn't he also write Valentine's Day?

[kiq fLP]

According with LPLive "Did You Know? Facts", Chester wrote the lyrics to 'Easier To Run' before any of the music was created for the song

[lpliveusername]

Yeah, The Messenger was written for his kids. He later changed the lyrics for the final version.

 

I don't know about the music, but his vocals on Blackout and Keys To The Kingdom were basically him "freestyling."

[hahninator]

Don Gilmore said Chester wrote a significant amount of Hybrid Theory, much more than he wrote on Meteora. Meteora is where Mike took over for the core LP songwriting but Don said Hybrid Theory was a Chester concoction.

[Geki]

Don Gilmore said Chester wrote a significant amount of Hybrid Theory, much more than he wrote on Meteora. Meteora is where Mike took over for the core LP songwriting but Don said Hybrid Theory was a Chester concoction.

I have a hard time believing that. Chester wrote a lot of lyrics on Meteora and MTM and he has said so himself in many interviews. MTM especially was an album where all the band members contributed because that's how they wanted to make that album. Watch the DVD. Mike says that he wanted everybody in the band to feel important and that's how they did it. If 1 band member didn't like something, they would change it, etc. They all had to contribute. And Chester wrote a shit ton on MTM. He said he wrote the lyrics to GU, TLTGYA. Mike told me personally that he wrote the lyrics to Valentine's Day. Chester came up with SOTD, etc. And the DVD also shows Chester doing lyrics with Mike. It wasn't just Mike and Brad. Mike and Brad may have created the music piece but Chester contributed a lot of lyrics on that album and prior. Meteora too, he wrote a lot. There's evidence of this stuff. ATS is really when Mike took over and Chester just let Mike and Brad go crazy and make cool stuff. Watch the DVD. ATS was Mike's baby, it's been said. And I think that stuck with albums after.

But back to HT, some of HT was written before Chester even joined. Mark Wakefield has credit on some of the songs. No doubt that Chester contributed a shit ton to the album, especially for songs like Crawling and way more. But Mike made a lot of that HT music. He probably means Chester did a lot of lyrics and helped with the song writing because during interviews it's been said that Chester wrote a lot lyrics in earlier albums. I think Chester even elaborated a few times, saying Crawling was about his struggle with drugs and his identity, Runaway about him when he was younger wanting to apparently ''kill everyone'' and runaway, etc. I'm willing to bet Papercut, With You and Pushing Me Away were also written lyrically with Chester's input. And they changed the lyrics to a lot of the old HT demos like By Myself, Forgotten, APFMH, etc. All that stuff Chester contributed. So I'm not saying you're wrong with that. But Chester did still write for Meteora and a lot for MTM, he probably wrote the most for MTM actually.

Edited June 10, 2018 by Geki

[Kilmer]

There's no evidence that Mike's role increased or Chester's decreased from MTM onwards. The actual quote says that Mike already worked like a producer within the band in previous albums, but Rick Rubin was the first one to point it out to him, and thus shared the credits. There are songs from MTM and after that we know to be autobiographical by Chester(Given Up, Valentine's Day, In Pieces, The Messenger, Heavy, Halfway Right); we also know Blackout and Keys To The Kingdom came from him freestyling the vocals, and we saw various LPTV videos where he appears discussing lyrics(The Catalyst, Burn It Down, A Light That Never Comes, just to mention a few). The Hunting Party was the only album where he said he was not that much in the studio, but that was because of STP, and even then he brought KTTK's chorus, War's guitar riffs and probably more.

[Geki]

There's no evidence that Mike's role increased or Chester's decreased from MTM onwards. The actual quote says that Mike already worked like a producer within the band in previous albums, but Rick Rubin was the first one to point it out to him, and thus shared the credits. There are songs from MTM and after that we know to be autobiographical by Chester(Given Up, Valentine's Day, In Pieces, The Messenger, Heavy, Halfway Right); we also know Blackout and Keys To The Kingdom came from him freestyling the vocals, and we saw various LPTV videos where he appears discussing lyrics(The Catalyst, Burn It Down, A Light That Never Comes, just to mention a few). The Hunting Party was the only album where he said he was not that much in the studio, but that was because of STP, and even then he brought KTTK's chorus, War's guitar riffs and probably more.

 

I say MTM for Chester because he did contribute a lot to that album. He said in interviews that he wrote the lyrics to Given Up and The Little Things Give You Away. He also came up with the original version of Shadow Of The Day. Mike also told me at a Meet & Greet in Holmdel, NJ back in 2014 that Chester wrote the lyrics to Valentine's Day, I had asked him what the song was about lyrically and he said you'd have to ask Chester, because he wrote the lyrics to that one. He also obviously wrote the lyrics to In Pieces, being about his ex-wife and the divorce, etc. The MTM DVD also shows Chester coming up with lyrics with Mike, there is an entire segment on it. Chester was also shown in a lot of the photos and videos for the making of MTM, much more than albums after MTM. He was even in the very early photos from the Korn Studio shown with the LPU Photo Journal in almost every photo.

 

But yeah, I'm not saying that he contributed less after MTM, because I don't know for sure, but it just seems like. It's not a bad thing, Mike and Brad were really the main songwriters all in all, especially Mike. I just think Chester did actually contribute a lot in the earlier years, more than people know, and we have a proof of a lot of it from the first three albums.

[DexLP]

Chester and Mike explained how they worked on HT in Kerrang 2008:

 

"Shinoda would first work with Delson on the music before he and Bennington would write lyrics.[...] The producer told them he didn’t like any of their songs. [...] Well, actually he liked two – Points Of Authority and With You,” says Bennington. “We basically had to write a new record in two months. We stayed at Mike’s house around the clock and wrote that album.”

 

But there were further – and far more serious – problems ahead. Bennington claims he was told he "the star" and that Linkin Park should be his band. Shinoda would be relegated to just being the keyboard player or, worse, jettisoned. Bennington resisted immediately: “I said, ‘Fuck you guys. Are you serious? I’ve only just got into the band, and you’re telling me to start a coup against the guy who writes all the music? It’s <i>his</i> band. If he could sing, I wouldn’t have a job. You fucking idiots, what’s wrong with you?’

 

Also, Chester did write the chorus of In The End a lot before joining Linkin Park as a poem. Both Mike and Chester revised it and added rap parts for the final version.

[Geki]

I know, I get it. Chester sucks, Mike is the king of the world. Chester contributed absolutely nothing to Linkin Park, etc. Your quote though disproves absolutely nothing in my entire post though, but yeah.

 

Your post proves that Chester wrote lyrics in Linkin Park even as far back as Hybrid Theory. He also has said in many interviews that he wrote lyrics to a lot of the Minutes To Midnight songs and some of Meteora songs. I can't give examples of albums after MTM but he definitely contributed a lot to the first three albums. And even if he did do nothing, which isn't true, he was still the voice of the band. He performed those songs. The world associated him with them either way. That's like saying the ghost writer for Taylor Swift deserves all the credit and Taylor doesn't. Ultimately it's really the performance and Chester sang most songs, especially with the first three albums. Hell, I remember people saying that Mike was barely on MTM at all and it was all Chester, even though Mike did some songs. Like I said, I can't say past MTM but yeah, for those first three albums, Chester helped a lot. It was just as much his band as anyone elses. LP was always a unit in those days.

Edited June 10, 2018 by Geki

[DexLP]

I know, I get it. Chester sucks, Mike is the king of the world. Chester contributed absolutely nothing to Linkin Park, etc. Your quote though disproves absolutely nothing in my entire post though, but yeah.

 

Why the hell do you feel attacked and think that my intention was to disprove you? I did nothing but quoting an interesting fact lol. I did not even talk about by myself, so how do you come to the point that I would think "Mike > Chester" ??

 

Also, it clearly says that they wrote the lyrics together like they both worked together for every single song, not like Mike wrote this one, Chester that one, and so one.. Probably they did it that way on Meteora as well, I can imagine.

[Geki]

Why the hell do you feel attacked and think that my intention was to disprove you? I did nothing but quoting an interesting fact lol. I did not even talk about by myself, so how do you come to the point that I would think "Mike > Chester" ??

 

Also, it clearly says that they wrote the lyrics together like they both worked together for every single song, not like Mike wrote this one, Chester that one, and so one.. Probably they did it that way on Meteora as well, I can imagine.

I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to attack you. I just wish some people would give Chester some more credit. He was a huge part of Linkin Park.

[hahninator]

Don Gilmore's post is great about saying Chester was working his ass of on Hybrid Theory and was the main driving force behind that album. Mike didn't start his semi-producer role until Meteora.

 

Chester wrote a lot of stuff over the course of the band. The core songwriting units are Chester, Mike, and Brad. Rob, Dave, and Joe are like the icing on the cake, especially later albums. Sure, Mike comes up with song demos, melodies, and shit, but Chester is the main lyricist and a huge writer.

[kiq fLP]

Also, Chester did write the chorus of In The End a lot before joining Linkin Park as a poem. Both Mike and Chester revised it and added rap parts for the final version.

I didn't knew it about In the End, is a cool fact. Would be the ITE chorus the whole poem or just part of it, since there's not many lines on it?

[Geki]

Don Gilmore's post is great about saying Chester was working his ass of on Hybrid Theory and was the main driving force behind that album. Mike didn't start his semi-producer role until Meteora.

 

Chester wrote a lot of stuff over the course of the band. The core songwriting units are Chester, Mike, and Brad. Rob, Dave, and Joe are like the icing on the cake, especially later albums. Sure, Mike comes up with song demos, melodies, and shit, but Chester is the main lyricist and a huge writer.

Read my above posts. Chester contributed a shit ton to Meteora and especially MTM, too. I think he contributed the most to MTM more than anything, actually.

[DexLP]

I didn't knew it about In the End, is a cool fact. Would be the ITE chorus the whole poem or just part of it, since there's not many lines on it?

 

I am not quite sure, there are no more information about it. But if you listen to the demo on LPU 11 you'll see that Mike's parts are totally different to the final version, so maybe one of both versions also include stuff from Chesters poem.

[Geki]

I thought the story of ITE was that Mike locked himself in a studio overnight in L.A. and the next day he had In The End in a pretty semi completed form, and he then showed it to Rob, who said he loved it. Chester hated ITE and OSC, so much so that he said he didn’t even originally want them on the record. But maybe he did come up with the chorus. The demos of ITE that we have are different lyrically so obviously they re-wrote the song and shit, and Chester laid down exceptional vocals for the album version (the Chester vocals on the demo were blah to me.)

I think Chester wrote lyrics for LP all throughout their career. Videos even show him writing lyrics for UIG off of THP and Heavy off of OML. I’m sure he contributed lyrics to every song on the main albums that have lyrics at some point or another. Mike and Brad come up with the music primarily and then Chester comes up with lyrics and melodies (he’s said before). But Chester has come up with some other stuff too like SIB intro, the guitar solo on SOTD, Blackout verses, etc. And probably way more.

[JZLP-Benningstrong]

Chester wrote tons of lyrics and came up with cool ideas like the solo of SOTD... Melodies came to his head and he recorded stuff ASAP in his phone.

 

Chester and Mike are the soul of the band.

[Geki]

Chester wrote tons of lyrics and came up with cool ideas like the solo of SOTD... Melodies came to his head and he recorded stuff ASAP in his phone.

 

Chester and Mike are the soul of the band.

 

Fantastic post. THIS x100.

[JZLP-Benningstrong]

Yeah just because he wasn't amazing at playing instruments or making beats doesn't make him a bad writer

[lpliveusername]

Also, Chester did write the chorus of In The End a lot before joining Linkin Park as a poem. Both Mike and Chester revised it and added rap parts for the final version.

What's the source of this?

[DexLP]

What's the source of this?

 

The german Wikipedia site of In The End says that, given a source which is not available anymore. But, it seems really capable because all other information is absolutely true just as other songs on german Wikipedia.

 

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_End

[lpliveusername]

Since I don't speak German, I used Google Translate to read those pages. There might be some mistakes there, but seems like Wikipedia is saying the rap verses came from a poem by Chester while the fan site used as a source says the original "ballad" demo was created by Chester.

 

The song was originally written and named as a poem by Chester Bennington , but was rewritten and adapted several times to fit on the album. That's how a rap part by Mike Shinoda came along.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_End#Entstehung

 

"In The End" is probably one of the best known and most successful songs by Linkin Park. Especially because the song reflected the then sound of the band very well: A melodic interplay between Chester Bennington's singing and Mike Shinoda's Rappen, paired with the earworm sound.

 

The song appeared on the debut album "Hybrid Theory" and was released in late 2001 as the fourth single. The lyrics deal with the mistakes of a person and the associated end of a long relationship or friendship.

 

The development of the song is a long one: When Chester joined the band in early 1999, he wrote this song under the simple name "Untitled" as a pure poem or ballad. In the following period, the song was rewritten several times, i.a. Various rap verses from Mike have been added. When the footage of "Hybrid Theory" finally arrived, the song was rewritten, among other things. the guitar and the drums were "amplified", so that the song fit better into the "tougher environment" on the album.

https://web.archive.org/web/20160405054116/http://www.hybridsoldier.de/lpr/index.php?p=7&sub=14&sid=8

 

I'm not sure about Chester's involvement on Mike's rap, but I know for a fact Mike wrote the original piano demo by himself and it already included the chorus lyrics. There are several interviews where he stated that:

http://linkinpedia.com/index.php?title=In_The_End#Background

[DexLP]

Just read in a german interview from 2010:

 

Mike: "Chester and I worked a lot more together on this album. It was a difficult process to write the songs with him. Previously it was most likely that the one who wrote the lyrics also sang it on his own. On our last album MTM we first started that we wrote lyrics for each other. So, for example, I sang lyrics he wrote. On this album (ATS) we sang a lot together. And then we turned one voice louder and one quieter when we did the mixing."

 

 

side news: The interviewer asked him how it was to write a song for a shooting game (Medal Of Honor) and Mike said that he was a hardcore gamer back in the days. He said word for word: "I AM a hardcore gamer by myself. I grew up with that. That's my generation."

 

 

Source: https://www.focus.de/kultur/musik/tid-19794/linkin-park-ich-bin-ein-hardcore-spieler_aid_550200.html(german)

[Geki]

Seems like Mike and Chester did the same amount for lyrics and vocals on the albums. The actual music was probably all Mike and Brad and they just had Rob, Phoenix and Joe perform it.