Waiting for the End

 Waiting for the End
"Waiting for the End" is a song by American rock band Linkin Park, released on October 1, 2010. It is the second single from their fourth studio album, A Thousand Suns, which was released on September 8, 2010. A music video for the single, directed by Joe Hahn, was released on October 8, 2010 on MTV.

"Waiting for the End", along with five other songs from A Thousand Suns, are featured in the "Linkin Park Track Pack" as downloadable content for the rhythm video game Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock. 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.

 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 also featured in CSI on CBS on October 14, 2010.[4] It is also featured on commercials for the show Fringe, and appeared on promo to disclose V's second season.


 Music video

The official music video directed by Joe Hahn 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.

Joe Hahn wrote a blog post describing the music video:
“     The clip is an experiment in making the most digital version of ourselves in the spirit of the visual pallette of A Thousand Suns. If you have been following our visuals throughout this album, this is the next step in our journey. I wanted to push ourselves so far down the digital path that it eventually felt spiritual. As we live our lives in the digital noise of today, we can find our center of humanity in the midst of the chaos. This is my illustration of that.

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."