MAC_32
Footballguy
LOVE this version
Mike Shinoda Just Win Baby Crawling
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This is the 4th song I have included in my top 31 from Linkin Park's Hybrid Theory album, their 1st studio album. The song peaked at #8 on the Billboard Hot Rock and Alternative Songs chart. It won the 2002 Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance.
The song that first drew me to listen to Linkin Park is my #1 in this countdown, but this song was the one that really clinched for me how much I liked their music. Up to that point, I had not really heard any music like Linkin Park, and I loved it.
Chester said this about the song:
"Crawling has caused me the most trouble live more than any other song. Just because it’s that one long note the whole time... There are definitely moments on every record where at the end I go "why... did I... do that?", you know? Crawling was that one for me on Hybrid Theory."
"Crawling is a really like... a really emotional song, it's got a lot of deep lyrics. It's kind of like admitting something that you don't really like to admit, which is, you know, having a problem with yourself. You know what I mean? And sometimes you have to like learn how to deal with living inside your own skin and being the person that you are. And that's not something to be ashamed of or anything like that. It's just something that isn't always peachy. You know what I mean? You're not always gonna be exactly the person that you wanna be or the person that you thought you were. You know? You gotta live with yourself for the rest of your life."
"It's easy to fall into that thing — 'poor, poor me', that's where songs like 'Crawling' come from: I can't take myself. But that song is about taking responsibility for your actions. I don't say 'you' at any point. It's about how I'm the reason that I feel this way. There's something inside me that pulls me down."
Brad Delson said this about Chester's vocals on the song:
"What happened when Chester joined the group, we moved from 'Hey, these are the kind of singing parts we want,' to 'Wow, these are singing parts that we never even thought of,' because his range and versatility are such that, like 'Crawling,' who would think to write that melody? You couldn't because there are very few people in the world that could probably sing that. So that's an example of when I say he really expanded our writing ability in the sense that he has such a range vocally. He really was kind of the final piece of the puzzle, and he brings vocal talent that, when we were looking for a second vocalist, we didn't see anything close to his talent in anybody else."
In 2020, Metal Hammer ranked the top 25 Linkin Park songs of all time and ranked Crawling at #3. Here is an excerpt from their writeup on the song:
The second single to be released from Hybrid Theory, Crawling won Linkin Park a Grammy in 2002 in the Best Hard Rock Performance category. Rolling Stone describe the anthem as “claustrophobic” and “burbling”, listing it as one of Linkin Park’s most essential songs.
Live, Crawling has featured guest appearances from the likes of Aaron Lewis, Chris Cornell and Fred Durst. The video, starring model Katelyn Rosaasen, centred on a young girl seemingly suffering abuse, and was filmed in Los Angeles. Katelyn, who had also appeared in videos by The Offspring and N*Sync amongst others, claimed it was her favourite starring role in any music video.
The video, which stars the band performing in a spooky house, has notched up over 100 million views on YouTube, and the track itself has currently claimed a cool 89 million streams on Spotify.
In 2021, Kerrang ranked the top 20 Linkin Park songs of all time and ranked Crawling at #7. Here is their writeup on the song from that ranking:
‘There’s something inside me that pulls beneath the surface / Consuming, confusing…’ The second single from Hybrid Theory felt like the first really deep dive into the damage underlying the songwriting. A reckoning on guilt and self-loathing, it sees Chester attempting to come to terms with the demons of his past: namely a teenage abuse of methamphetamine, with its tendency to conjure hallucinations, anxiety and the unsettling sensation of something moving beneath his skin. Although the singer would note in later years that the song remained difficult to perform live, the anthemic quality – and lyrics left open enough to carry fans’ projections of their more everyday angst – ensured it became a favourite and 2002 winner of the Best Hard Rock Performance Grammy.
In 2023, Loudwire ranked all of the Linkin Park singles to that point and ranked Crawling at #5. Here is their writeup on the song from that ranking:
Chester Bennington does the heavy lifting here, showing vulnerability in the verses as he shares his own internal struggle of feeling a loss of control over his substance abuse. That vulnerability gives way to extreme angst in the chorus as he belts, “Crawling in my skin / These wounds they will not heal.”
The song was the second single from the band’s breakout Hybrid Theory album and would earn them their first Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance.
The band remixed the Hybrid Theory version of this song for their remix album Reanimation. That version of the song is here, and features Aaron Lewis (Staind). This is one of their best remixes IMO, love it.
RIP, Chester