Rob Bourdon

Drummer Rob Bourdon was born on January 20, 1979, in Calabasas, CA.
The youngest member of Linkin Park, Rob was introduced to his mother's friend and Aerosmith drummer Joey Kramer after a show and from there became inspired to learn the drums. Starting out around the age of nine, Bourdon joined his first band, a quartet called No Clue, in grade six. They later changed their name to Physical Evidence and covered bands like Nirvana, Bad Religion, and Suicidal Tendancies. Rob took drum lessons for a year, but became tired of reading sheet music because he enjoyed playing the music of his favorite bands by ear instead. After joining his high school's jazz band in grade ten, Rob was recruited by two members of a band called Karma after a concert to join their group. Through the Karma bandmembers, he met Brad Delson and Mike Shinoda, who both lived nearby in the San Fernando Valley. Eventually, Rob and Brad would form their own band called Relative Degree, whose sound he likens to 311. Their dream was to perform at the Hollywood club 'The Roxy', a goal they eventually attained, and broke up soon afterwards. After the band's break-up, Rob's life became a turmoil of drug and alcohol abuse. It was these hard times that took his focus away from drumming. Eventually, by the end of high school, Rob got his life back in order and began playing full-time again. Soon, he got a call from Mike Shinoda asking him to join his and Brad's band, Xero.

Rob grew up in the town of Calabasas, California, where he attended Agoura High School with members of Hoobastank. He currently resides in Los Angeles. In his spare time, Rob likes to play the piano, practice drumming, and surf.

David Michael Farrell

AKA David Michael Farrell

Born: 8-Feb-1977
Birthplace: Plymouth, MA

Gender: Male
Religion: Protestant
Race or Ethnicity: White
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Bassist

Nationality: United States
Executive summary: Bassist for Linkin Park

David Farrell was brought into the world in the historic East Coast town of Plymouth, Massachusetts, but was transplanted at the age of five to the historic West Coast town of Mission Viejo, California. His introduction to musical performance was largely provided by his mother, who taught him how to play the guitar. In his teens he became active with the local music scene, joining the Christian punk band Tasty Snax during his high school years; the band's name was later shortened to simply The Snax, and Farrell accordingly shortened his string count from six to four (although later sometimes making a halfway return up to five). After graduating from high school he enrolled at UCLA, where he ended up as the roommate of Brad Delson, a guitarist still active with his own high school band Xero. Delson eventually coaxed Farrell (now calling himself "Phoenix") into Xero's ranks as bass guitarist, and together they skipped merrily through the wonderland of the L.A. club circuit.

In the late 90s Farrell was presented the opportunity to tour with The Snax, and finding the offer too compelling to pass up, he turned in his notice with Xero and spent the next year and a half traveling with his old bandmates. In his absence Xero changed their name first to Hybrid Theory and then Linkin Park, sold themselves to Warner Brothers, recorded and released their multi-platinum debut Hybrid Theory (featuring some of Farrell's compositional input, but with bass duties being shared between Delson and Scott Koziol), and established themselves as one of the industry's leading corporate rock bands. This change in circumstances must have made it a matter of small effort for the band to coax Farrell back into their ranks, which was accomplished soon afterwards. His recording debut with Linkin Park was finally made in 2002 on the Reanimation remix album, to which he added performances on both vioin and cello. His status as a fulltime contributor to the band's recorded output was cemented with the release of Meteora in 2003.

Michael Kenji "Mike" Shinoda

Michael Kenji "Mike" Shinoda (born February 11, 1977[1][2]) is a Japanese American musician, record producer, and artist from Agoura Hills, California. He is best known as the rapper, songwriter, keyboardist, vocalist and rhythm guitarist of rock band Linkin Park, and as a solo rapper in his side-project, Fort Minor. He also provides artwork, production and mixing for both groups.
Shinoda was born and raised in the Los Angeles suburb of Agoura Hills. His father, Leslie, is Japanese American. He has a younger brother named Jason. Shinoda attended Parkman Elementary and Lindero Canyon Middle School.

As per his mother's wishes, Shinoda began his classical piano training with lessons around the age of six, his enthusiasm eventually growing. At the age of thirteen, he expressed the desire to move towards playing jazz, blues, and even hip-hop.During his middle school and high school years, he added the guitar and, eventually, rap-style vocals to his repertoire.

After his teens, Mike Shinoda's rap interests found a source of encouragement in Brad Delson, with whom he started to write and record songs in a makeshift studio set up in his bedroom. Shinoda attended Agoura High School with Linkin Park bandmates Brad Delson and Rob Bourdon as well as with members of the band Hoobastank. By the end of high school, Bourdon had become involved in their musical ventures. The trio formed the band Xero, and began to make a more serious attempt to pursue a career in the music industry. Chester Bennington came along a few years later.

After high school, Shinoda enrolled in the Art Center College of Design to study graphic design and illustration. It was here that he made the acquaintance of DJ and turntablist Joseph Hahn, who, along with Delson's college-mate Dave "Phoenix" Farrell, was soon added to Xero's line-up. At only 21 years old, Shinoda eventually graduated from college with a degree in illustration, securing himself a job as a graphic designer right after graduation. With his background as a graphic artist, Shinoda has taken it upon himself in designing all of Linkin Park's artwork with Hahn, and has even designed the album cover for Styles of Beyond's debut album, 2000 Fold. In later years he would go on to showcase his art skills;[citation needed] he had his debut art showcase (Diamonds Spades Hearts & Clubs) at Gallery 1988[citation needed] in Los Angeles in the time leading up to Linkin Park's album Minutes to Midnight.

Joseph "Joe" Hahn

Joseph "Joe" Hahn (born March 15, 1977), better known by his stage name, Mr. Hahn, is an American turntablist and director best known as the DJ for the band Linkin Park.

A Korean American, Hahn was born in Dallas, Texas and grew up in Glendale, California. He began deejaying in high school, and attended Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California. In college, he met Mike Shinoda, and joined his band Xero, which later became known as Linkin Park. In 2002, Hahn became the first Korean American to receive a Grammy when the band won the award for Best Hard Rock Performance.

Besides serving as Linkin Park's DJ, Hahn has directed several of the band's music videos, such as those for "Numb", "Somewhere I Belong" and "Pts.Of.Athrty". In a 2003 interview, he told MTV that film-making was his true passion, and that "doing the music [was] more of an extra thing". Hahn provided special effects work on The X-Files and the miniseries Frank Herbert's Dune. He also directed a short film called The Seed, and acquired the rights to produce a film adaption of China Miéville's novel King Rat.

Bradford Phillip Delson (born December 1, 1977) is an American musician, best known as the lead guitarist and one of the founding members of the Grammy Award winning rock band Linkin Park. He is also the A&R Representative for Machine Shop Recordings.
Brad Delson attended Agoura High School with childhood friend and Linkin Park band mate Mike Shinoda. He played in various bands throughout his high school career, the most notable being Relative Degree, in which he met and teamed up with drummer Rob Bourdon. Relative Degree's goal was simply to play a show, and, after achieving that goal, they disbanded.

After graduating in 1995, Delson, Shinoda, and Bourdon formed Xero, which would eventually become the starting point for Linkin Park.

Delson entered UCLA in 1995 as a Regent Scholar working toward a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communication Studies with a specialization in Business and Administration. He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and shared a dorm room with future Linkin Park band mate Dave Farrell for three out of his four years at school. Delson also had the opportunity to intern with a member of the music industry as part of his studies and ended up working for Jeff Blue, an A&R representative at Warner Bros. Records, who offered constructive criticism on Xero's demos. Incidentally, it was Blue who later introduced Chester Bennington, the current lead vocalist of Linkin Park, to the rest of the band.

After graduating summa cum laude in 1999, Delson decided to forgo law school in order to pursue a musical career with Linkin Park. He remains an avid fan of all things blue and gold.

Chester Bennington

Chester Charles Bennington (born March 20, 1976 in Phoenix, Arizona) is an American musician and singer-songwriter. He is best known as the lead vocalist and songwriter in the rock band Linkin Park.

Bennington rose to fame with his first release with Linkin Park, Hybrid Theory, in 2000, which was a massive commercial success. The album was certified Diamond by the RIAA in 2005, making it the best-selling debut album of the decade. Linkin Park's following studio albums, Meteora and Minutes to Midnight, released in 2003 and 2007 respectively, continued the band's success. Bennington formed his own band, Dead By Sunrise as a side-project in 2005. The band's debut album, Out of Ashes was released on October 13, 2009.

In 2007, Bennington was placed at #46 on Hit Parader's list of "Heavy Metal's All-Time Top 100 Vocalists".

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

Before joining Linkin Park, Bennington was a vocalist in Grey Daze, a post-grunge band from Phoenix, Arizona. He left Grey Daze in 1998, but struggled to find another band to play in. 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. 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". Bennington and Mike Shinoda, the band’s other vocalist, made significant progress together, but failed to find a record deal. After facing numerous rejections, Jeff Blue, now a vice president of A&R at Warner Bros., intervened again to help the band sign with Warner Bros. Records.

For Linkin Park Fans

The two had attended high school together, where they met the band's drummer, Rob Bourdon. Shinoda hooked up with DJ Joseph Hahn while studying illustration at Art Center College in Pasadena. Meanwhile, attending UCLA, Delson shared an apartment with bassist Phoenix, who left the band after college and returned a year later. At this point, they named themselves Xero and recorded several demo tracks. They never got signed, and the project floundered. Then Shinoda decided to hire a vocalist, and put out an ad. They got Chester Bennington, a transplanted Arizona native who started making records when he was 16. 'When I was two, I used to run around singing Foreigner songs - there's tapes of me doing that... since I learned how to talk I've been telling everybody I was gonna grow up to be a singer.' laughs Bennington.

The band called itself Hybrid Theory after the addition of Bennington (the idea being that they were a hybrid of rock and rap), however, due to a trademark issue with a band called Hybrid, they were forced to change their name. Some discarded ideas (serious or not) were Clear (the band's favorite), Probing Lagers (which they thought was the lamest), Ten PM Stocker (because they would record every night at 10 pm at a place on Stocker Street) and Platinum Lotus Foundation. Eventually, they settled on Lincoln Park, suggested by Bennington because after band practice he would have to drive past there to get home. However the domain 'lincolnpark.com' cost more than the band could afford, so they changed the spelling to Linkin Park. However, it has also been suggested that the name 'Linkin Park' was suggested so that the band would appear right next to Limp Bizkit at record stores.

Working with an independent label, the band recorded the album Hybrid Theory EP, which featured 'Carousel', 'Technique', 'Step Up', 'And One', 'High Voltage', 'Part of Me'.

After being signed to Warner Brothers in 1999 their first album, Hybrid Theory, was released in 2000. It was the top-selling album in the United States and New Zealand in 2001, with the hit singles 'One Step Closer', 'Crawling', 'Papercut', 'In The End' and 'Points of Authority'. The album is notable for its absence of profanity, in contrast to many other nu metal bands' songs.

Linkin Park were part of the Ozzfest in 2001, touring along side Marilyn Manson, Slipknot, Crazy Town, Papa Roach, and Disturbed. Linkin Park have also created their own tour - Projekt: Revolution, and on it have toured with Cypress Hill, Adema, DJ Z-Trip, Xzibit, Mudvayne and Blindside.

In 2002, they released a remix album of their Hybrid Theory album, called Reanimation, as well as releasing a remix version of their song, 'Points Of Authority'.

In 2003 their new studio album was released, titled Meteora, which debuted at #1 in the US and UK, and #2 in Australia. It contained the singles, 'Somewhere I Belong', 'Faint', 'Numb', 'From The Inside' and 'Breaking The Habit'. Later in the year, they joined forces with fellow nu-metal band Limp Bizkit and Metallica for the Summer Sanitarium Tour 2003. From this tour, Linkin Park released a new CD/DVD set called Live in Texas. This set contains tracks from their three previous records, and was filmed on location at their Summer Sanitarium performances in Dallas and Houston, Texas.

In 2004, Linkin Park created the Meteora World Tour. This tour included Linkin Park, P.O.D, Hoobastank and Story of the Year.

In 2004, Linkin Park was touring with Snoop Dogg, The Used, Korn, and Less Than Jake on the main stage, and No Warning, Ghostface, Funeral For A Friend, and Downset on the second stage as part of Projekt Revolution 2004. They also had a travelling DJ, Z-Trip with them, along with Irvin the Urban Action Figure.

On November 30, 2004, Linkin Park released Collision Course, a collaboration with rapper Jay-Zfeaturing rap-style remixes ('mash-ups') of songs from Meteora and Hybrid Theory using lyrics from Jay-Z's repertoire. Collision Course debuted at #1 in the US, but only got to # 17 in the UK. In Holland Collision Coursemade it to a 7th place. Their first Collision Course hit single 'Numb/Encore' reached #1 at the Free Record Shop Download Charts in Holland.