Mike Shinoda recently reflected on writing the iconic song after its music video hit a billion views on YouTube.

"There’s a weird battle with hopelessness and the ephemeral nature of time and our lives that the song is really about," he said. "What’s so odd about the song is it's almost talking about these things and saying ‘I don’t have any answers.’ Because usually a song isn’t about having no answers, right? It just kind of runs itself around in a circle lyrically. And especially as a young person that’s just how I felt, that’s how we all felt, we just didn’t know what to make of things. In a sense that’s still what goes on today. It’s a timeless and universal thing."

The "In The End" demo will be featured on Linkin Park's Hybrid Theory 20th edition box set, which is slated to drop on October 9. See the original lyrics below.

Linkin Park "In The End" demo lyrics

It starts with one…

One, then multiplies ’til you can taste the sun

And burned by the sky you try to take it from

But if it falls, there’s no place to run

Crumbling down, it’s so unreal

They’re dealing you in to determine your end

And sending you back again, to places you’ve been

And bending your will ’til it breaks you, within

And still, they fill their eyes

With the twilight through the skylight

And the highlights on a frame of steel

See the brightness of your likeness

As I write this on a pad with the way I feel

Hear the screaming in my dreaming

As it’s seeming that you’ve played your part

Like you’re heartless, take apart this

In the darkness, but I know that I’ve tried so hard

I tried so hard and got so far

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter

I had to fall to lose it all

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter

I’ve looked down the line

And what’s there is not what ought to be

Held back by the battles they fought for me

Calling me to be part of their property

And now, I see that I get no chance

I get no break

Fakes and snakes quickly lead to mistakes

And as the tightrope within slowly starts to thin

I can only hope that they close their eyes

To the twilight through the skylight

And the highlights on a frame of steel

See the brightness of your likeness

As I write this on a pad to the way I feel

Hear the screaming in my dreaming

As it’s seeming that you’ve played your part

Like you’re heartless, take apart this

In the darkness, but I know that I tried so hard

I tried so hard and got so far

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter

I had to fall to lose it all

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter

I’ve put my trust in you, pushed as far as I can go

For all this, there’s only one thing you should know

I’ve put my trust in you, pushed as far as I can go

For all this, there’s only one thing you should know

I’ve put my trust in you, pushed as far as I can go

For all this, there’s only one thing you should know

I tried so hard and got so far

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter

I had to fall to lose it all

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter

Photo: Getty Images

Bill Moran

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