Mike Shinoda admits he's been "all over the place" since Chester Bennington committed suicide in 2017.
Mike Shinoda
The 41-year-old musician starred alongside Chester in Linkin Park, and he's experienced a "rollercoaster" of emotions since he took his own life.
Mike explained: "[Chester's passing] affected everything, sometimes in very overt ways, and sometimes in more ... subtle ways.
"I feel like ... grief is a rollercoaster, right? It doesn't go in a straight line. I actually used to be under the impression that the stages of grief [denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance] that people talk about were in order.
"And the reality is, they're not. At all. They just kind of ebb and flow and happen in a random order. Some days you'll have one emotion that threads through the whole day.
"Other days, you'll be completely switching from one emotion to the next every minute; from feeling depressed to feeling anxious to feeling happy to feeling angry. You're all over the place, but it wasn't a straight line from there. And these songs are the same way."
But Mike says his creativity has proven to be cathartic for him.
He told Kerrang! magazine: "I really believe in the cathartic power of making things.
"When I've had my most difficult times, painting and making music have helped me get through. Sometimes diving into the pain and writing what's on my mind, other times using the art as an escape. But either way, it helps me to work through it."
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