Linkin Park Co-Founder Chester Bennington Dead At 41

Chester Bennington, the singer and co-founder of the rock group Linkin Park, was found dead at a residence in Palo Verdes Estates near Los Angeles earlier this morning. The Associated Press reports that it was a suicide by hanging.

Details have not been disclosed, but Bennington was a close friend to Soundgarden singer Chris Cornell, who hanged himself in May.

Today would have been Cornell’s 53rd birthday.

Linkin Park was formed in the mid-’90s, with Chester Bennington singing opposite rapper Mike Shinoda. In 2000, the group became an alternative rock station favorite with the release of its album Hybrid Theory with hit singles like “One Step Closer” and “In the End.” The group also contributed the original song to Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (“New Divide”) – “What I’ve Done, the first single from the band’s third album Minutes to Midnight, was used as the main theme for 2007’s Transformers.

With news of Bennington’s suicide, fellow musicians and celebrities have taken to Twitter to mourn his sudden passing.