MTV: Let's talk about your success. You've sold over a million records...

Mike Shinoda: We've sold a million records?

Chester Bennington: We did?

MTV: Have you?

Shinoda: Whoa!

Bennington: Yeah, we actually did go platinum.

MTV: How does it feel to blow up like this?

Bennington: It's tiring.

Shinoda: Yeah, it's tiring. If the record flopped we'd be really bummed, so we just think about that and it keeps us grounded — like what it would be like if we put it out there and nobody bought it.

Bennington: Not only that, but also we don't even think about how many we're selling. We just focus on our shows and our fans. That's pretty much what we're about, just playing shows for our fans and getting out there and talking to as many of them as we can and hanging out with them. I think that's also a key to the reasons we're getting the success that we're getting so fast. The fact that we kind of have a real connection with our fans, and our fans are the best fans in the world. Don't mess with them.

MTV: You've watched your audience grow and grow ... how is that?

Shinoda: What's cool is that right now we've got a nice variety — we're playing some bigger shows, we're playing some smaller venues. There's an advantage to both. We like playing big shows because you get to see all those kids and it's really energetic, and we like playing the smaller ones, too, because you can be intimate with the crowd and see your fans face to face.

Bennington: We're also playing with a lot of really cool bands. We've played with some really cool bands that we admire. Now we get a chance to go out with Deftones and tromp around Europe with them, and that's just ... I mean, that's where we're seeing the benefits of the success.

MTV: Let's talk about the success of "One Step Closer." When you play that song in front of a crowd, I'm sure they go nuts.

Shinoda: Yeah. "One Step Closer" is really cool because it's short.

Bennington: Yeah, it's short and fun.

Shinoda: It's a great way to end the set and a great chance for kids to —

Bennington: Beat each other up.

Shinoda: Yeah. Get rid of all the energy they got left.

Bennington: Kids really go off on that song, 'cause obviously that's the one everyone has heard. But a lot of kids seem to be paying attention to every song on the record, so what's really cool is the more familiar the crowds are with who we are, they're singing along to every song. There have been points where they've actually overpowered the band, and we've actually stopped playing and let them sing the song and hold the microphones out ... [Shinoda mimes holding out mic] like that — thanks, Mike — and just let them do their thing. It's a lot of fun to actually have to stop playing.

Shinoda: That's actually why we have two singers, so that we can just do that type of thing. Like, when I'm talking, Chester can hold the mic out like so: [Bennington mimes holding out mic] See? We're good at that. That's how it works.

Bennington: We're a team. Wow. Sometimes I'm amazed that we're not just, like, one person.

MTV: Tell us about the video for "One Step Closer."

Shinoda: Please don't ask us what the video is about.

Bennington: There's no plot.

Shinoda: We don't know what this video is about. Joe [Hahn], our DJ, is the only one who knows what it's about, and he won't tell us.

Bennington: He's an alien anyway.

Shinoda: I think that's why he won't tell us, 'cause we wouldn't understand. But our DJ, Mr. Hahn, wrote the original treatment, sent it out to a bunch of directors and lucky for us, they were feeling that. They came back to us with similar treatments.

Bennington: They came back to us with the cost-efficient [version].

Shinoda: It was really similar, and so Joe got a chance to really get in there with our director, Gregory Dark, and make it happen. I think they worked really well together. They went kickboxing together, so I know they hit it off.

Bennington: I think they like each other.

Shinoda: Yeah, they're kind of sweet on each other.

Bennington: We kind of just like ninjas and dark tunnels and fire.

Shinoda: And guys with big hair that look like werewolves.

Bennington: Grr! Arr!

MTV: How did you find the video-making process?

Bennington: Fun, but really tiring. That is one of the most physically challenging things to do, because you're not just going in for your little part. You go in and you pretty much put in a 20-hour day. You're working for the entire time the shoot is going on, 'cause they have to do it very fast.

Shinoda: One of the special things that was going on in our video was it was underground, very far underground. It was really dirty and dusty under there...

Bennington: So there was no oxygen. Just lots of mold and dust.

Shinoda: Yeah. Lots of dust. Meanwhile, while we're playing our song a hundred times over and over, we're also breathing in dirt and not breathing in oxygen.

Bennington: There's nothing like screaming "Shut up" for seven hours straight, upside down. That was another thing — when they hung me upside down, all the blood in my body rested in this small space in my head, 'cause I don't have that big of a melon. It was the most excruciating thing. I felt like my head was going to explode like a pimple. It was kind of gross.

MTV: Do you know what your next single's going to be?

Shinoda: No, what is it going to be? Oh, I thought you were going to tell us.

Bennington: Yeah, what do you think it should be?

MTV: "Points of Authority."

Shinoda: That's weird. Why would he say something like that?

Bennington: I have no idea.

Shinoda: Do you like that song? Is that a good song?

MTV: Yeah.

Shinoda: OK. Thanks!

MTV: You guys really don't know what your next single's going to be?

Bennington: We have no idea.

Shinoda: Good job, Chester. Good boy.

MTV: Any songs you'd like to see released as the second single?

Shinoda: We can't go into it, really.

Bennington: I have to plead the Fifth.

MTV: No problem. I guess that means no video plans for the second single?

Shinoda: Oh, the video's all planned out. We just don't know what song it's going to be for.

Bennington: Yeah. We totally have the concept and we've scouted out the location and —

Shinoda: We've basically begun shooting already.

Bennington: The treatment's been written and we've already begun filming, we just don't know what song it's going to be for.

Shinoda: We'll shoot a video for all the songs, and then just pick according to whatever single we release. It will be really inexpensive.

Bennington: It'll be like "Version 1," "Version 2."