Devin Townsend

Devin Townsend, the Canadian singer and guitarist rooted in progressive metal, earned the description “multi-everythingist” from rock journalists; in addition to his standing as a skilled instrumentalist he functions as composer, producer, arranger, and bandleader. His first appearance on record came as vocalist on Steve Vai’s 1993 album Sex & Religion, after which he contributed to projects by Front Line Assembly and Skinny Puppy while fronting the punishing extreme-metal unit Strapping Young Lad. Since issuing the 1997 sci-fi opus Ocean Machine (Biomech), his solo recordings—more than two dozen studio and live sets—have generated ongoing discussion within extreme-music circles. The Devin Townsend Project, his most widely recognized progressive and shape-shifting vehicle, delivered the albums Ki (2009), Ziltoid (Dark Matters) (2015), and Transcendence (2016), each received as unified yet provocative statements welcomed by metal and prog-rock listeners alike. The solo album Empath surfaced in 2019, followed in 2021 by the simultaneous double release The Puzzle/Snuggles and then by Lightwork in 2022.

Born May 5, 1972, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Townsend began on banjo at age five before switching to guitar at twelve and soon leading the band Grey Skies, later renamed Noisescapes. A demo sent to the Relativity label secured both a solo contract and the invitation to sing on Sex & Religion; the association continued with Vai’s 1996 album Fire Garden. In the intervening years he collaborated again with Front Line Assembly and, under the Strapping Young Lad name, released the 1995 album Heavy as a Really Heavy Thing. A detour through the satiric punk outfit Punky Bruster produced the Cooked on Phonics LP before he returned to Strapping Young Lad for the 1997 album City. Departing from the industrial and death-metal palette of earlier work, he formed Ocean Machine with J.R. Harder and Marty Chapman, issuing the more accessible Biomech later that year.

Townsend’s first solo album credited under his own name, Infinity, appeared in 1998 shortly after he received a bipolar-disorder diagnosis; he later cited the condition to account for the contrasting sonic approaches of Strapping Young Lad and Ocean Machine. A more focused and melodic speed-metal effort, Physicist, arrived in 2000, while 2001’s Terria explored ambient pop textures. February 2003 saw the self-titled Strapping Young Lad album return to conventional death-metal territory, recorded during the same period as the Devin Townsend Band’s debut Accelerated Evolution, released only a month later. Critics praised the latter for its willingness, in a post-grunge climate, to reference 1970s and 1980s arena rock. Although 2006’s Synchestra fell short of that standard, Townsend maintained momentum by following the straight ambient The Hummer with Ziltoid the Omniscient, a rock opera centered on an alien’s quest for “the ultimate cup of coffee.”

After Ziltoid, Townsend withdrew from the industry to rest and reconnect with the cathartic dimension of writing. In March 2009 a shaven-headed, teetotaling Townsend announced a four-album sequence under the Devin Townsend Project banner, framed as proof he could generate new music without chemical assistance. November 2009’s Addicted emerged as the strongest entry, featuring former Gathering vocalist Anneke van Giersbergen, who later assumed a central role on the 2012 pop-infused Epicloud. The ambitious double album Z² followed in 2014, pairing the Devin Townsend Project’s Sky Blue with the conceptual Dark Matters, a sequel to 2007’s Ziltoid the Omniscient. April 2015’s performance at London’s Royal Albert Hall was documented on Ziltoid: Live at the Royal Albert Hall. Despite declaring a year off, Townsend continued writing and, in March 2016, announced the new DTP album Transcendence, released that September; afterward he dissolved the group. Over the ensuing years he toured selectively with shifting lineups, issued three volumes of his catalog on vinyl, and began work on his most expansive undertaking. Titled Empath, the project was introduced with a social-media caveat to listeners: “Some of you won’t like it. Some of you will be very confused by it. Some of you will be alienated by it.” The warning stemmed from Townsend’s history of releasing albums that captured his exact creative moment, even when those moments encompassed multiple styles. With the 2019 Empath he instead sought a single sonic framework that would encompass every musical territory he had previously explored—sometimes within one track—while signaling a path ahead. Participants included Mike Keneally as music director, former employer Steve Vai, the Elektra Women’s Choir, Casualties of Cool collaborator Ché Aimee Dorval, Anneke Van Giersbergen, drummers Morgan Ågren, Anup Sastry, and Samus Paulicelli, plus Chad Kroeger, whose encouragement had prompted the album. Upon release the set drew largely favorable notices, yet Townsend characteristically endorsed both positive and negative assessments equally. A live document, Order of Magnitude: Empath Live, Vol. 1, followed in October 2020.

December 2021 brought the simultaneous arrival of The Puzzle/Snuggles, Townsend’s nineteenth and twentieth albums. The former is described as “an elaborate and much more chilled out” counterpart to 2004’s Devlab and “more a collaborative, multimedia internet art project,” while the latter was “meant to be something you listen to in order to feel better… Puzzle is chaos, Snuggles is calm.” The undertaking reflected Townsend’s sense of emerging into light after the darkness of the pandemic. The following November he released Lightwork, assembled from material composed during quarantine and realized with veteran producer Garth Richardson. The standard ten-track edition was supplemented by a deluxe version that doubled the track count and included the companion album Nightwork.