Mike Shinoda finds Chester Bennington imitators ‘creepy.’
“We just want Emily to be Emily,” the singer told Los Angeles radio station Alt 98.7. “The songs are the songs. Emily is Emily… There was a time early on, like 2020-ish, 2019, whatever — like, I remembered I was watching videos… I think a video of a cover band, a Linkin Park cover band, showed up in my feed. Fans were loving it. They were all like, ‘Oh my God, this person’s so good. They sound so much like Chester.'”
He continued, “Your brain likes it better and better and better the more it gets more real and close to the real thing, and then the moment before it becomes exactly as real, your brain goes completely the opposite direction … right back down to ‘I hate it,’ because your brain can tell that it’s trying to be tricked. And nobody’s brain likes that.”
“So, when I was watching this YouTube video, or Instagram video, of this cover band, I was like, ‘That’s really cool, but it’s also creepy that it sounds so much like Chester.’ I don’t like it, it weirds me out,” the musician explained. “It made me immediately know that it wasn’t the move for us. I don’t like it. I like it for [the cover bands], I just don’t like it for us… These bands do a great job, but I wouldn’t put that in our band.”
Linkin Park announced their return in September during a livestream, introducing Emily Armstrong as their new co-vocalist. Fans were divided after learning about her possible connections to Scientology and Danny Masterson, a convicted rapist. Armstrong later made a statement to address the concerns.
“We’ve all talked about it with each other and with her a million times, and we’re still talking about it,” Shinoda also said in September. “One difficult thing that people are experiencing is just that they’ve heard Linkin Park for so long with Chester’s voice and the idea of somebody else being in that role, it feels really different. I know that in the context of the music that’s not released yet, I know that I love it. I think her voice is incredible.”
He added, “And the best thing for people who have such a strong connection to Chester to know, just to know about me, is that Chester was a one-of-a-kind person and a one-of-a-kind voice, and Emily is also a one-of-a-kind person and a one-of-a-kind voice. She’s not trying to be him. She’s trying to be her. And it so happens that I think she singing on these songs sounds like Linkin Park.”
Linkin Park’s first album with Armstrong, ‘From Zero’ arrived on November 15, 2024. The band is set to perform in Saudi Arabia on December 12.
