Chester Bennington Biography

Early life and Education Of Chester Bennington

Chester Bennington was born on 20 March 1976 in Pheonix Arizona. His father was a police detective, worked with child sex abuse cases, and his mother was a nurse. He has two half-sisters and one brother named Brian.

During his early age, he was much interested in music, as his inspiration bands are Stone Temple Pilots and Depeche Mode. 

When he was at the age of 11, his parents got divorced, and his father got custody of him. After his parent's separation, Chester got addicted to alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, opium, and LSD.

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Once in an interview, he disclosed that he had suffered sexual abuse from an older male friend at his age of seven. He was too afraid to ask for any help, as he did not want people to think he was gay. He said the abuse went on until he was thirteen.

The incident and his situation at home distressed him so much that Chester felt like killing people and running away. To console himself, he wrote poetry, drew pictures and wrote songs.

Somehow, Chester said the abuser's identity to his father but decided not to continue the case when he realized the abuser was a victim himself.

When he was at his age of seventeen, he shifted in with his mother. Bennington was grounded after his mother discovered his drug use. Chester had worked at Burger King before he started his career as a professional singer.

Chester's childhood was harsh and was even bullied physically during his high school days. In one of the interview, he opened up saying, " I have been knocked around like a rag doll at school for being skinny and looking different."

Chester Bennington's Career

Grey Daze

Chester Bennington's career began as a singer with a band Sean Dowdell and His Friends? they released nominative three-tracks cassette in the year 1993. Later the group formed a new band called Grey Daze, a post-grunge band.

After releasing few songs with the band, he left the band in 1998 and moved on to find another group.

Linkin Park

Chester was cramped and almost ready to quit his musical dream when Jeff Blue, vice president of A&R at Zomba Music in L.A, invited him to an audition with the prospective member of Linkin Park.

He left his day job at a digital services firm and moved to California along with his family, where he gave a successful with Linkin Park, who was called Zero then. He sacrificed his birthday celebration to record his song for the audition.

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Chester along with Mike Shinoda, another vocalist of the band, made impressive progress together; however, they failed to land a record deal. After getting a lot of rejections, Jeff Blue, intervened again to help the band sign with Warner Bros.Records.

Later on, October 24, 2000, Linkin Park released their first album, Hybrid Theory. He and Shinoda wrote the lyrics based on some early material. Bennington later described the songwriting experience to Rolling Stone magazine at the beginning of 2002, 

"It's easy to fall into that thing- 'poor, poor me', that's where songs like 'Crawling' come from: I can't take myself. But that song is about taking responsibility for your actions. I don't say 'you' at any point. It's about how I'm the reason that I feel this way. There's something inside me that pulls me down."

Dead by Sunrise

Chester also co-founded Dead by Sunrise in early 2005 with Orgy and Julien-K members Ryan Shuck and Amir Derakh. They made their first live debut in May 2008 and performed four songs at the 13th-anniversary party for Club Tattoo in Temple, Arizona.
Stone Temple Pilots

In the year 2013 February, Stone Temple Pilots parted ways with long-time singer Scott Weiland. The band replaced and trained Bennington to replace Weiland in May 2013. After that, the same year on 18 March, he took the stage at KROQ's Weenie Roast with the band.

The band released a free download song of their first single, Out of Time that featured Bennington through their official site.

Later he reflected on joining the Stone Temple Pilots, as he said 

"Every band has its vibe. Stone Temple Pilots has this sexier, more classic rock feels to it. Linkin Park is a very modern very tech-heavy type of band. I grew up listening to these guys. When this opportunity came up, it was just like a no-brainer."

He added singing lead vocals in Stone Temple pilots was his biggest dream. He left the band but on good terms due to his commitment with Linkin Park in the year 2015.

Chester Bennington's Personal life

Chester Bennington was a married man. He was married to Talinda Ann Bentley ( his third wife) in the year 2005, who was a former Playboy model. They have three children together Tyler Lee Bennington and twins Lila and Lily.

His first wife was Samantha Marie Olit. They tied the knot on 31st October 1996. They had one child together named Draven Sebastian. The couple divorced in 2005.

Bennington had a child named Jamie, born on 12 May 1996, with his affair with Elka Brand. Later in 2006, Chester adopted Brand's other son, Isaiah.

During the first year of his marriage with Talinda, Bennington with his wife was harassed by a cyber stalker named Devon Townsend for almost a year. Later Townsend was found guilty of tampering with couple's email, also sending threatening messages and was sentenced to two years in prison.

Chester was also a tattoo enthusiast. He also did some works and promotions with Club Tattoo parlor in Tempe, Arizona. The owner of Club Tattoo is Sean Dowdell, Bennington's friend since high school.

In January 2011, Bennington said in an interview in response to the 2011 Tucson shooting

"There's a non-violent way to express yourself and get your point across-regardless of what you're saying or what your point is. In a free society, every people have a right to believe whatever they want to believe. That their business and they can speak their mind but nobody, even in a free society, has the right to take another person's life ever. That's something that we need to move beyond."

Chester Bennington's Health and injuries

Chester Bennington was plagued with poor health issues during the making up of Meteora, as he struggled to attend some of the album's recording sessions.

Later in the summer of 2003, Bennington suffered from extreme abdominal pain and gastrointestinal issues while filming a video for Numb in Prague. He returned to the United States for surgery and shot the remaining video in Los Angelos.

In the year 2007, Chester sustained a wrist injury while attempting to jump off a platform during a show in Melbourne at the Rod Laver Arena. Despite, he carried on to perform the entire show with a broken wrist, before going to the emergency room and got five stitches.

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Bennington again fell ill in 2011, and Linkin Park was forced to cancel three shows and later rescheduled two from the A Thousand Suns World Tour. He injured his shoulder during the band's tour in Asia and was advised by doctors to have immediate surgery.

In 2015 January, he injured his ankle during a basketball game. Bennington tried to cope with the injuries and performed with the aid of crutches, also knee scooter. Later the band canceled the rest of their tour to allow Bennington to undergo surgery and recover.

Chester Bennington's Death

Chester was found lifeless at his Palos Verdes Estates home in California by his housekeeper around 9 a.m. PDT on 20th July 2017. The apparent cause of death was suicide by hanging.

Later his bandmate, Shinoda confirmed his death on Twitter, posting "Shocked and heartbroken, but it's true. An official statement will come out soon as we have one.

His death occurred on Chris Cornell's 53rd birthday, one of his closest friend, who also died of suicide by hanging two months ago. Cornell's death might have left a deep wound in his heart that led Chester to take such a step. Cornell's son, Christopher was his godson.

He had suffered from depression for a long time and also battling against his drug and alcohol addiction. In his last interviews, Chester spoke about the problems he faced and encouraged other people suffering from depression to speak out about it.

Chester Bennington's Net worth

As an American singer, songwriter, and actor, Chester had a net worth of $30 million. Some of his songs are still at the top of the chart, which helped him become more financially successful and popular.