"Waiting for the End" is a song by American rock band Linkin Park, released on October 1, 2010. It is the second single and eighth track from their fourth studio album, A Thousand Suns, which was released on September 14, 2010. A music video for the single, directed by Joe Hahn, was released on October 8, 2010 on MTV. It received mostly positive reviews from critics and reached number 42 on the US Billboard Hot 100. "Waiting for the End", along with five other songs from A Thousand Suns, is featured in the "Linkin Park Track Pack" as downloadable content for the rhythm video game . The track pack was released on October 19, 2010. It was also released as one of six Linkin Park songs released in a pack for Rock Band 3 on January 11, 2011, though it was the only track from A Thousand Suns to be included in that pack. "Waiting for the End" is Mike Shinoda's favourite Linkin Park song.
Background
"Waiting for the End" was announced as the album's second single at the time of the album's release. The track features minimal distorted guitar and differs from many previous Linkin Park singles. The song features reggae-style verses by Mike Shinoda followed by both chorus and verses sung by Chester Bennington. The breakdown of the song uses remixed portions of Bennington's vocals. This song was featured in on CBS on October 14, 2010.
Music video
The official music video is directed by Joe Hahn. The video was filmed in September 2010, before the release of A Thousand Suns and was released to MTV on Friday October 8, 2010. The video features the entire band performing the song in darkness along with heavily experimental digital effects and distortion applied to them. The video also carries the themes of the artwork for their album, A Thousand Suns, with many shots of abstract artworks featuring animals and digital-themed media. As of May 2020, the song has over 185 million views on YouTube. Joe Hahn wrote a blog post describing the music video: In celebration of the band's North American tour, an alternate live video of the song premiered in the band's official site and YouTube channel. It was filmed by numerous fans on January 26, 2011 at the United Center in Chicago, and January 28 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul. The version played in the video is the actual live performance of the song. The video was placed at #28 of the year by VH1's Top 40 Videos of the Year.
Reception
Michael Menachem of Billboard gave the song a positive review, saying " 'Waiting for the End' offers the grandness of 'Numb' and 'Faint', but producer Rick Rubin's polyrhythmic framework and the group's moralistic lyrics set it apart from Linkin Park's past hits." MTV's James Montgomery praised the song, describing it as "one part soaring, big-boned ballad, one part rattling, slightly Ragga dancehall toast, and zero parts anything LP have previously attempted." Tim Grierson of About.com listed the song as the fifteenth best rock song of 2010, saying that "Balancing rapped and sung vocals, the hopeful, resilient track builds to a beautifully rousing finale."
"Waiting for the End" debuted at number 96 on the US BillboardHot 100 upon the release of the album. After falling off and re-entering the chart more than once, it has reached number 42, remaining 23 weeks on the chart. It has also obtained number 2 on the Rock Songs chart. After spending 15 weeks on the Alternative Songs chart, it replaced "Tighten Up" by The Black Keys at number 1, giving the band their tenth number 1 song on the chart. As of June 2014, the single has sold over 1,058,000 copies in the US, becoming their 9th best selling single in the US. Despite peaking lower than "The Catalyst", it was the most successful single in the US from the album. Outside the US, the song was generally less successful than "The Catalyst". Chester Bennington said this about the success of the single in an interview with MTV on February 7, 2011:
