LOVE? BY STRAPPING YOUNG LAD

BACK IN THE early part of the new millennium, Devin Townsend was, by his own admission, in a bad way. “To a certain degree my entire career has been based on me trying to unfuck myself,” he half smiles when asked to recall a difficult chapter of his life. “During that period I was screwed up, but totally by my own hand. This is no ‘Oh woe is me’ thing; I had just become totally fascinated and immersed in my creative process and I hadn’t had kids yet. I think, in hindsight, I was actively going out of my way to make myself crazy so that I could write crazy music.”

Today, we all recognise Devin one of as heavy metal’s true visionary voices, but in 2004 he was treated with a touch of suspicion by the mainstream metal world. Despite having put his name to records like Strapping Young Lad’s crushing and his stirring and epic solo album – both now rightly regarded as classics – he had yet to cross over to metal’s wider fanbase. Instead, he was almost exclusively being painted as ‘crazy’, a ‘mad scientist’ or an ‘eccentric’ by the rock press, who leaned heavily on his openness regarding his mental health issues.