Linkin Park has done it again. The band’s music video for “In The End” has surpassed a billion views on YouTube.
Originally released in 2000, the version of the video that reached the milestone was added to YouTube in 2009 (the video has been uploaded to the platform three times, though the billion view version is the only one still listed).
“In The End” is the band’s second video to reach the billion view milestone. In 2018, “Numb” made history as the first music video from the 2000s to garner that many views. That video’s view count is currently at more than 1.4 billion.
Said vocalist/songwriter Mike Shinoda about “In The End’s” production in an interview with Linkin Park Web (as reported by Blabbermouth),
“I came up with the piano and the chorus music and chorus lyrics. Then Brad [Delson, guitar] came up with the guitar in the verse and we worked on the bassline and composition. From there, I think everybody in the band began chipping in and adding their parts and critiquing each other’s parts. And right before we went into the studio to record it, we scrapped the beat I had originally written for the verse, and had Rob [Bourdon, drums] do a new one, which is the one that we recorded.”
Back in 2012, singer Chester Bennington revealed that he was not a big fan of “In The End.” He told VMusic,
“I was never a fan of ‘In The End’ and I didn’t even want it to be on the record, honestly. How wrong could I have possibly been? I basically decided at that point I don’t know what the fuck I’m talking about, so I leave that to other people who are actually talented at somehow picking songs that people are going to like the most. It also gave me a good lesson, as an artist, that I don’t necessarily have to only make music, in my band, that I want to listen to. More often than not, something that I like, very few other people like, and something that those people like is something that I kind of like, or don’t like at all. And that’s cool, it gives me a new appreciation for the songs. But, you know, now I love ‘In The End’ and I think it’s such a great song. I actually see how good of a song it is, it was just hard for me to see it at the time.”
The second single from Linkin Park’s debut album, Hybrid Theory, “In The End’s” popularity helped propel the album to number two on the Billboard 200 and launched the band’s career into the stratosphere. Since its release in 2000, Hybrid Theory has since gone multiple times platinum in countries around the globe.
Hybrid Theory will be celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. The band says that they have “special things planned” for the occasion, though nothing official has been announced yet.
Linkin Park last played together during a tribute to Bennington in October 2017. Bennington committed suicide in July 2017.
Earlier this week, Shinoda announced that he will be releasing a second solo album. Dropped Frames, Vol. 1, was recorded during Shinoda’s frequent Twitch streams and will be released on July 10 via his Kenji Kobayashi Productions label. He also revealed a couple of weeks ago that an unreleased Linkin Park song featuring Bennington exists.
