Chester Bennington’s mother, Susan Eubanks, has expressed her feelings regarding Linkin Park’s choice to move forward with a new singer. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, she revealed that she felt betrayed by the band’s decision.

“I feel like they’re trying very hard to erase the past,” Eubanks stated. “They’re performing songs that Chester sang. And I don’t know how the fans are taking it, but I know how I take it. And having [Emily Armstrong] singing my son’s songs is hurtful.”

Eubanks learned about Armstrong joining the band through Google, initially thinking that Mike Shinoda would take on the lead vocals since Chester had taught him how to sing. “He sang a song on [2017’s] One More Light that I thought was beautiful until Chester died; then I couldn’t listen to it anymore. I thought if they were to go back out, it would just be the band not adding a singer,” she explained.

She admitted that she couldn’t bear to hear Armstrong sing Chester’s parts. “But it was her, I’m just going to say it, screeching her way through a very high note. And I got out of there as fast as I could,” she shared. “I cried.”

In a similar vein, Chester’s son Jaime Bennington has voiced concerns about the band’s direction, suggesting that Mike Shinoda has been in control since his father’s passing. “The band is not Mike Shinoda’s band. Fort Minor, ‘The Rising Tied,’ ‘Post Traumatic,’ those are Mike’s solo projects,” he noted. “I’ve antagonistically claimed that ‘Post Traumatic’ is actually a Linkin Park album and that they’ve never stopped Linkin Park — it’s just been undercover for multiple years experimenting with their process and on their audience using techniques that I believe are grooming techniques.” Jaime has discussed these thoughts in depth on his Instagram and YouTube live streams.