Linkin Park
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49 free Linkin Park trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Linkin Park started as three friends from Agoura High School recording in Mike Shinoda's bedroom under the name Xero, got rejected by Warner Bros. three times, and then released the best-selling album of 2001. They named themselves after a Santa Monica park and changed the spelling to grab a web domain. Two decades and 100 million records later, they lost Chester Bennington, went quiet for seven years and came back with a new singer and From Zero. These 49 questions run the whole story: the Whisky a Go Go debut, Jeff Blue, Grey Daze, the names Plear and Platinum Lotus Foundation, the Grammy for Crawling, Projekt Revolution, the shakuhachi on Meteora, Paul McCartney crashing Numb/Encore, Fort Minor, the Doomsday Clock title, Transformers, the 8-Bit Rebellion game, Kiiara on Heavy, the Hollywood Bowl tribute, Emily Armstrong, Colin Brittain and the Champions League final. Easy questions stick to members and albums; the expert tier asks about Hans Zimmer, Griffith Observatory and the first DVD. Every answer is cited to a page we checked, with a short explanation so you learn something even when you miss. Play it solo or print it for a rock trivia night.
30 of 49 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which California city was Linkin Park formed?
Agoura Hills
Agoura Hills is where three of the founders met at the local high school, though the park behind the band's name lies in another city altogether.
Q 02Where was Linkin Park's first demo recorded?
Shinoda's bedroom
Shinoda's bedroom, in his parents' house, held the mixing desk for the four-song demo, which failed to win a record deal and cost the band its original singer.
Q 03What was Linkin Park originally called, before it had a record deal?
Xero
Xero was the name on the 1997 demo tape that failed to land a record deal; a new singer arrived, and two more band names followed before the first album.
Q 04After Chester Bennington joined, Linkin Park briefly used which name, later the title of its debut album?
Hybrid Theory
Hybrid Theory had to go when the label warned of confusion with an electronic act called Hybrid, so the name the band had picked for itself survived only on the record.
Q 05Linkin Park borrowed its name from Lincoln Park, a public park in which California city?
Santa Monica
Santa Monica had in fact renamed the park after a late mayor in 1997, more than two years before the band adopted its old name.
Q 06Why did Linkin Park respell the "Lincoln" in its name?
To get the web domain
To get the web domain: the band wanted the presidential spelling, Mike Shinoda has said, but chose L-i-n-k-i-n so that it could own the matching .com address.
Q 07Which 1990s rock band did Chester Bennington also front from 2013 to 2015, alongside Linkin Park?
Stone Temple Pilots
Stone Temple Pilots hired him after firing Scott Weiland; he made one EP with them, High Rise, and left on good terms in 2015 to concentrate on Linkin Park.
Q 08What did Chester Bennington leave early in 1999 to record his audition for the future Linkin Park?
His own birthday party
His own birthday party: an A&R man had offered him the audition, and Bennington, turning 23 in Arizona, slipped away from the celebration to record his vocals.
Q 09Chester Bennington came to Linkin Park from which Arizona alternative rock group?
Grey Daze
Grey Daze, which he co-founded as a teenager in 1993, was planning a reunion when he died; an album built around his original vocals came out in 2020.
Q 10What did Linkin Park guitarist Brad Delson almost always wear on stage?
Large headphones
Large headphones: Delson wore them to protect his hearing, and they became such a trademark that one profile said his head looks naked without them.
Q 11At which West Hollywood club did the future Linkin Park play its first show, in November 1997?
Whisky a Go Go
Whisky a Go Go saw the band open for SX-10 and System of a Down; Mike Shinoda recalls wearing a white beanie, goggles and gloves to feel like a performer, and says they were awful.
Q 12Which song was Linkin Park's debut single?
One Step Closer
One Step Closer grew out of Chester Bennington's frustration with the album's producer, who kept demanding rewrites; the anger went straight into the lyrics.
Q 13Which album gave Linkin Park its first Billboard 200 No. 1?
Meteora
Meteora went straight in at the top in 2003, selling more than 800,000 copies in its first week, after the debut and the remix album that followed it had both stopped at No. 2.
Q 21Linkin Park's album title A Thousand Suns echoes words made famous by which atomic scientist?
Robert Oppenheimer
Robert Oppenheimer made the line from the Bhagavad Gita famous when speaking of the atomic bomb; the album samples his voice and takes nuclear fear as its theme.
Q 22Which rapper teamed up with Linkin Park for the 2004 mash-up EP Collision Course?
Jay-Z
Jay-Z was asked by MTV to pick a partner for a mash-up show and named Linkin Park; the EP that followed was, at the time, only the second ever to top the Billboard 200.
Q 23Which music legend made a surprise appearance with Linkin Park at the 2006 Grammy Awards?
Paul McCartney
Q 14Which Linkin Park single climbed to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2002?
In the End
In the End won over its own singer: Chester Bennington admitted he was never a fan and had not wanted it on the record, then watched it become the band's signature song.
Q 15Which song won Linkin Park its first Grammy, for Best Hard Rock Performance, in 2002?
Crawling
Crawling drew on Chester Bennington's struggles with drugs and alcohol, and he said it gave him more trouble on stage than any other song.
Q 16What is the name of Linkin Park's official fan club and street team, founded in 2001?
Linkin Park Underground
Linkin Park Underground doubled as a street team, like the online one the unsigned band had built while pushing its EP through chat rooms; for years its members received an annual disc of rarities.
Q 17What was the name of Linkin Park's own touring festival, launched in 2002 with Cypress Hill on the bill?
Projekt Revolution
Projekt Revolution set out to put rock and hip-hop acts on one bill: it began with a single stage and added a second, for smaller bands, in 2004.
Q 18What is the title of Mike Shinoda's 2018 solo album, written after the death of Chester Bennington?
Post Traumatic
Post Traumatic began as a three-song EP in January 2018 and grew into a full album by June, each track tracing his feelings in the months after his bandmate died.
Q 19What was Linkin Park's 2002 remix album, featuring Black Thought and Jonathan Davis, called?
Reanimation
Reanimation respelled every title to match its reworked songs, so that "Points of Authority" became "Pts.OF.Athrty", and it entered the Billboard 200 at No. 2.
Q 20Linkin Park's album Meteora is named after a region of rock-top monasteries in which country?
Greece
Greece: Mike Shinoda said the word caught his attention because it sounded huge, and the band wanted the album to feel as epic as the rock pillars themselves.
Paul McCartney walked on mid-performance and sang "Yesterday" with Chester Bennington, the Beatles ballad taking over part of the band's own mash-up.
Q 24What is the name of Mike Shinoda's hip-hop side project?
Fort Minor
Fort Minor let Shinoda write and play almost everything himself, and its ballad "Where'd You Go" reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Q 25Which producer did Linkin Park choose for its 2007 album Minutes to Midnight?
Rick Rubin
Rick Rubin told the band to forget whatever it thought fans wanted to hear; most of the album was recorded at his mansion studio in Laurel Canyon.
Q 26The title of Linkin Park's album Minutes to Midnight refers to what?
The Doomsday Clock
The Doomsday Clock supplied the title after a band member watched a documentary that kept repeating the phrase; midnight on that clock stands for the end of the world.
Q 27Linkin Park's "What I've Done" plays over the closing credits of which 2007 blockbuster?
Transformers
Transformers used the song for its final scene and credits; for the 2009 sequel the band went further, writing a new song and weaving its melody into the orchestral score.
Q 28Linkin Park met which famous film composer in 2009 to rework "New Divide" into themes for a blockbuster's score?
Hans Zimmer
Hans Zimmer and his team had already started working the new song into the music when the band arrived; the finished score is credited to his colleague Steve Jablonsky.
Q 29What was the name of Linkin Park's 2010 video game for iOS devices?
8-Bit Rebellion!
8-Bit Rebellion! turned the six members into pixel characters, and finishing it unlocked an unreleased song that later surfaced as an album bonus track.
Q 30Linkin Park gave "The Catalyst" its live debut at which Los Angeles landmark during the 2010 MTV VMAs?
Griffith Observatory
Griffith Observatory, a hilltop landmark seen in many Hollywood films, was kept secret until the performance went out live during the awards show.