It came out on October 24, 2000, and within a year it was the best-selling album in America. Linkin Park’s debut took its title from the band’s own discarded name, they were called Hybrid Theory before they were Linkin Park, and recorded it at NRG Studios in North Hollywood with producer Don Gilmore. Twelve tracks, under thirty-eight minutes, no wasted motion. Rap traded with melody, distortion traded with turntables, and underneath all of it a voice that sounded like it meant every word.

The numbers got absurd. RIAA Diamond by 2005, eventually certified twelve times platinum, over 27 million sold worldwide, the best-selling debut album since Appetite for Destruction in 1987.

The strange part: the song that made it immortal almost didn’t ship. Chester Bennington had reservations about “In the End” and didn’t want it out as a single, too soft, he thought. It became the band’s signature hit and one of the most-played rock songs of its era. The album he was unsure about is the one that everyone remembers. Put it on and hear why he was wrong.