The future of Linkin Park has been up in the air since frontman Chester Bennington’s untimely passing in July 2017. Since then, co-vocalist Mike Shinoda has shared a variety of possibilities regarding the band’s next step, however, nothing has been confirmed.
In a recent interview with Rock Antenne , Shinoda has discussed the possibility of Linkin Park replacing Bennington with a new vocalist, whilst opening up about how the rest of the band has dealt with Chester’s passing.
Shinoda said that if the band were to find a new vocalist it’d to happen “naturally”, however, they could never completely “replace” Chester.
“That’s not my goal right now. I think it has to happen naturally. And if we find somebody that’s a great person that we think is a good personality fit and a good stylistic fit, then I could see trying to do some stuff with somebody. Not for the sake of replacing… I wouldn’t wanna ever feel like we were replacing Chester.”
In January last year, Shinoda released his solo EP Post-Traumatic, in which he played a slew of solo shows off the back of. During the interview, Shinoda said that although he used the experience as a healing process in dealing with Chester’s death, the rest of the band “weren’t ready” to make music again.
“We all thrive making and performing music, and so to not do that, I think, is hard. It definitely would be hard for me. I didn’t wanna spend the last year not doing it, and I knew that the band was not ready to do it, so I wanted to go do it myself.”
“I know the other guys, they love to get onstage, they love to be in the studio, and so to not do that would be — I don’t know — almost unhealthy. If doing that means that we need to have some other people in the mix in order to do it and do it well, then we would do that.”
Last year, Shinoda noted that he was also “open” to playing more Linkin Park gigs in the future, discussing again in this interview that more shows are still on the cards.
“I think there are many fans that want to continue to see the guys onstage and wanna continue to hear the music,” Shinoda continued, “and if we put a show up online, they’ll wanna come. So as long as that connection and interest is there, I think that’s a driving force to figure it out. But, like I said before, it has to happen naturally. I’m not running out and putting up ‘vocalist wanted’ posters. I think that’s wholly inappropriate and probably a terrible idea.”
One More Light – Linkin Park
