It’s been a rough couple days. I haven’t been feeling well, so I’ve been cooped up at home, mostly resting.
To entertain myself I’ve been watching lots of YouTube videos on TV through my Roku. At first I was watching hip hop videos with lots of women in them, like Cyclone by Baby Bash and Bartender by T-Pain. Because watching half-naked women is always fun.
Then I wanted to slow it up, and chill out just a little but. So I popped on the video for One More Light, by Linkin Park, which is the best song on their most recent album. The song I chose is the album’s namesake.
The video is live concert footage from their tour. Chester Bennington, the band’s super dynamic lead singer, appears onstage and kind of floats above the crowd, touching random fans’ hands briefly.
The audience all hold up their cellphones and put the flashlight feature on, creating a thousand points of light, to use a phrase from George H.W. Bush’s acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in New Orleans in 1988. The video then cuts to the band on their tour bus, and the band performing in arenas across the country. There are also scenes of the band meeting with communities devastated by natural disasters around the US.
When we return to the concert footage, Bennington is again standing above his mostly young fans, who reach out to touch him like he’s Jesus Christ incarnate. He cuts a striking figure with his heavily tattooed and chiseled physique, and the veins pop on his neck as he sings emotionally.
As for the song itself, I absolutely love it. The lyrics are so deep. Here’s the chorus:
Who cares if one more light goes out
In the sky of a million stars?
It flickers, flickers.
Who cares when someone’s time runs out
If a moment is all we are?
Or quicker, quicker.
Who cares if one more light goes out?
Well, I do.
This is powerful stuff. Bennington positions himself as the all-healing, all-knowing, omnipotent god who cares about the “light” of every one of his fans. His fans are mainly the troubled and vulnerable teenagers and young people who loved his music.
Now don’t get me wrong. I’m 43, and I loved Linkin Park too. But I never saw them as an answer to all my problems. Whereas I believe some of his younger fans truly believed Bennington was speaking directly to them. Either way, it’s a dope video, and it really puts me in a positive, emotional, melancholy yet energized mood.
I decide to watch one more Linkin Park video. I flip around YouTube on the Roku and stumble upon Rolling in the Deep, which is a rare cover song performed by the band. The original was recorded by Adele in 2010.
It’s an great song. Bennington begins by gripping the mike tightly, then closes his eyes and belts out the first verse, which closes with:
The scars of your love remind me of us
They keep me thinking that we almost had it all
The scars of your love, they leave me breathless
I can’t help feeling
We could have had it all
(You’re gonna wish you never had met me)
Rolling in the deep
When Bennington reaches the crescendo and calls out “Rolling in the deep,” he instantly opens his eyes and tilts his head back, like he’s just had an orgasm. Or maybe he’s feeling deep relief because he’s finally been set free.
The audience sings along in harmony to the chorus. Everyone in the arena knows and loves every song by Linkin Park, so his devoted fans are ready to accompany him at any time.
He then closes his eyes again and goes back to singing the second and third verses. But while he’s singing, he does something interesting. He sticks out his right index finger, and part of his middle finger, and kind of extends them, almost in a pointing, Lord of The Rings kind of way.
It’s like he’s reaching out to the audience to touch them with the force of his radiance and power. He’s letting them feel his touch, figuratively, even if he’s still onstage, so that they can be active participants in the art he’s creating. All in all, it’s a powerful performance, and it really rocks me to my core.
After the video ends, I pause the Roku. I go into my kitchen, where my laptop is, to get some thoughts down on the two videos I’ve just seen. One thing I can say for sure, Linkin Park, and Bennington in particular, definitely had some kind of messianic complex. He styled himself as the savior of his tortured fans’ souls.
At the same time, he was a tortured soul himself, who ultimately, and tragically, committed suicide after battling drug and alcohol problems for years. Perhaps Bennington’s star burned so brightly that he just wasn’t destined to stay on this earth for too long. His dynamism overshadowed us mere mortals, and it was more than the earth could handle.
In the end, after watching these two videos, I’m left with a sense of awe at the raw power of Bennington’s voice, and his ability to move people. I don’t think I’ve listened to One More Light even one time without crying at least a little, that’s how emotional the song is for me. Maybe I want a savior too, just like his young fans.
What I can say for sure is that Linkin Park, and Chester Bennington in particular, were one of the most important bands of the past twenty years. His death was a tragedy, for his family, his fans, and the global music community.
Chester, we miss you. Why did you have to go and do what you did? We needed you here on earth. You left us all alone. We’ll carry on, but we’ll miss you every day. Life will be a little less bright without you, and you won’t be around to care about when our light goes out. Instead, we mourn your light.
RIP.
