BLEED IT OUT GOODBYE CHESTER

I really like Chester Bennington. I really like his music, his singing and his lyrics. I also like being alive. Thus, suicide is an issue that is very difficult for me to understand.
I just don’t get it.
I once talked a friend out of killing himself in an frightening all-night affair at his house. I talked my ass off about all the good things in life. Come morning he seemed ok and I was so proud of myself for “saving” him. He took his life the very next evening. (Here On Medium BIG RED BUTTON) I had a schoolmate with whom I had not seen for thirty years, and she came back into my life in the form of written words and pictures. We engaged in an intimate correspondence that lasted three years, until she shocked me (and her family) and unexpectedly took her own life. A cousin of mine lost his first born son to suicide. My brother lost his first born son the same way.
Celebrities have also been known to take this murky path. It shocks, because it is such an irrevocable path. When celebrities do away with themselves, it even seems to shock us more, because one would think that fame must be pretty cool. Plus, you are aware that they do not have the money problems we mere mortals are faced with each and every day. A depressed celebrity could make a phone call and find themselves on a jet taking them to any beautiful place on the planet.
Which means I obviously do not understand mental illness.
In the field of suicide, (It is a profession these days) there are several definitions regarding suicidal expressions that are defined as diverse thoughts and actions — including life-weariness, death wishes, and spur-of-the-moment suicide plans. The so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who attempts to kill himself doesn’t do so out of ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract conviction that life sucks and cannot ever improve. And certainly not because death seems suddenly appealing.
The person in whom its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill himself the same exact way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning building. It doesn’t matter if he has six kids at home. They jump because there is no other way out.
It would take too much space to add a list here of celebrity names, but the departure of the late great comedian/actor Robin Williams still stings. His hanging depressed me.
And yesterday it was Linkin Park’s incredibly talented singer- Chester Bennington. Listening to some of his lyrics, perhaps one should not be so surprised, but of course, we are. “Given Up” was explicable, in so many ways.
Wake up in a sweat again
Another day’s been laid to waste
In my disgrace
Stuck in my head again
Feels like I’ll never leave this place
There’s no escape
I’m my own worst enemy
I’ve given up
I’m sick of feeling
Is there nothing you can say?
Take this all away
I’m suffocating
Tell me what the fuck is wrong with me
Or perhaps, “In The End”
I tried so hard and got so far
But in the end it doesn’t even matter
I had to fall to lose it all
But in the end it doesn’t even matter
Linkin Parks fans know that Chester had a troubled childhood, he was sexually abused at seven, became addicted to drugs as a teenager following his parent’s divorce and eventually found refuge in poetry and music.
My youngest son Steven was a huge Linkin Park fan. I first heard Chester’s threatened singing come from behind the closed door of his bedroom. It was eye-opening, a heavy metal roar, but yet, amazingly lucid. And then- he would sing in a crystal clear voice, and it was a choirboy’s voice, beautiful, soulful, magnificent.
Chester’s cleanly articulated songs accented with that thunderous roar gave many kids (and adults) a vision of an emotional struggle that was known to all of us at one time or another in our lives.
Chester’s voice literally personified the angst of his deeply personal lyrics. I was stunned hearing how easy he made it appear to switch back and forth from his powerful screams to his tender singing.
When Linkn Park released the CD “Minutes To Midnight” in 2007 my son was a little disappointed, claiming it was not the Linkin Park he had known and loved. Yet Steven still admitted it was great. In fact, it was the only time in our lives that father and son both loved the same album at the same time.
Personally, I was blown away by the album, and especially by Chester’s performance throughout. “Bleed It Out” was one of the best songs I had heard in years. Lyrically a masterpiece, and sung as only Chester could sing it, with his parts brilliantly wrapped around Mike Shinoda’s mind-blowing rap. No one could have pulled this song off other than Linkin Park. That tune, along with “No More Sorrow”, “What I’ve Done”, “Shadow of The Day” and “In Pieces” and more, were songs that simply stunned and thrilled.
Again, I could just fill up pages by listing all the amazing moments on this album, so I’ll leave it with this memory.
My son and his best friend “Drumstick” were listening to the CD all the time. I remember one night they were playing “Given Up” again and again. I went into the room out of curiosity and they were both trying to sing the vicious vocal solo in the middle. They were literally red in the face from trying! Drumstick was in a German choir, and had been singing all of his life. He had wind. But he could not pull off Chester’s breathtaking solo. In this song, Chester holds a single note twenty seconds long, a “roaring lion” note I must add, and at precisely ten seconds into the solo, he changes the tone. He goes even deeper. It was fucking spectacular.
Chester Bennington’s death occurred on what would have been Chris Cornell’s birthday. Cosmic coincidence? Yes, Chris Cornell was a close friend of Chester Bennington. Soundgarden’s amazing singer had also died of suicide by hanging just two fucking months ago.
Mike Shinoda has since noted that Chester was very distressed when the band performed “One More Light” in Chris’ honor, and that he could not ever finish singing the song, be it in rehearsal or live recording. Chester also sang Leonard Cohen’s heartbreaking song “Hallelujah” at Chris Cornell’s funeral.
Now, we are all getting together here for a send off to Chester with a loud Linkin Park evening. We’ll dig out copies of “Meteora”, “Hybrid Theory”, and of course, “Minutes To Midnight”. We’ll get numb on German beer, crawl in our skin thinking about Chester really being gone, and remember the little things that give you away.
“And the clouds above move closer
looking so dissatisfied
and the ground below grew colder
as they put you down inside
but the heartless wind kept blowing, blowing”
We’ll feel you Chester in the heartless winds, but also every time we feel any emotion at all. Thanks for having the courage to show us all that pain and emotion all those years. We shall miss you.
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