Linkin Park - Bennington's Suicide Threat

LINKIN PARK frontman CHESTER BENNINGTON contemplated suicide after his first marriage broke down - because he was deep in the grip of alcoholism.

The singer split from his wife Samantha, the mother of his son Draven, in 2005 after nine years together.

Bennington fell apart after the break-up because he was furious about their divorce settlement, and he turned to booze and drugs as a way out, drinking to the point where he could no longer "function."

He tells Britain's Kerrang! magazine, "Leaving my wife was the easy part - the difficult part was losing all my money, starting my life over and having to pay the person I didn't want to be around in the first place. I felt like my life's work had been given away. I drank myself to the point where I couldn't leave the house and I couldn't function. I wanted to kill myself. I could very easily not be the person who's sitting herre right now. I could be dead. It was a horrible, horrible existence."

Bennington subsequently spent several stints in rehab and now claims to be completely sober, but he's still haunted by his past.

He adds, "There are still things I struggle with. I don't like being an alcoholic. (It's) my biggest enemy."