ADD Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

A lot of this exists in metal. The two main genres would probably be death and progressive. The hyperactivity of many compositions that start out in a great direction, but wind up going 360 can be rather irritating and may make you wonder 'can they repeat this erratic song structure style live'? Case in point, Death's Individual Thought Patterns album. Amazing album, yes! But I get into a lot of the compositions that are presented and Chuck does a 360 on me, then begins an entirely different composition! Another all-time favorite ADD band would be Dillinger Escape Plan. Now there is a band that makes me ask the question 'can they repeat this erratic song structure live'? Although the answer is yes, it still irks me with death metal and progressive metal that the potential of some amazing compositions aren't fully realized. I'll bet that five or six chord progressions in a death metal song or progressive metal song can easily be made into five or six songs...

Thoughts? Bands that you think possess this quality?

well when the idea to make this topic came up in you we were talking about Mithras so let me start with them

so for you, and wrathchild gave me exactly the same opinion some time ago, Mithras are just doing way too much at the same time, perhaps starting rhythms and just generally strings in their songs only to turn away from those again moments later, so lets say "they dont really have a focus" or "they seem to be doing everything at once", now that we talked about this i can understand very well how this might be very annoying to some people, for me however it makes the music extremely interesting and fascinating, to each his own i suppose
and then again, i have a very strong case of ADD myself, that might have something to do with my fascination of this type of thing

also the guitarist of Falconer seems to do this kind of thing in my eyes. of course here it's not really a centrepiece of the music, only occurs on some songs and is mainly only about the guitar, but it's still something that keeps sticking out to me. it sometimes seemsalmost like the band is playing something together and then suddenly the guitarist feels like playing a rock'n'roll solo in between and then continue with a completely different melodyline or riff then before the solo, while the band just keeps on playing along the same lines together, it just sounds like the guitarist just doing whatever he feels like "just because he wants to"
again though this is something i love and perhaps one of the greatest things of Falconer to me

those two are two of my top five favourite bands so it seems like i really enjoy this "ADD effect". please give me any recommendations for this that you can mates
(i'll probably check into that Death album too)

I would give an example of Necrophagist. They do way too much at once, and start off too fast. I like to hear a build up in melody and then explode into an extreme passage, but the other side of me loves it and each time I listen to them I hear something new in the music. Then there is spawn of possession, that also incorporates ADD, I think it works well with extreme metal bands since it just adds to the music, chaotic, complex and sometimes confusing.

Emperor does it too, but they do it the best of em all IMO, its layered in a way that just adds to the melody of the music just like in Prometheus.

Fantomas.

Musical ideas on this band's albums rarely last more than 15 seconds... Thats pretty ADD to me

Botch is the only similar band to Dillinger that i can think of right now

this topic makes me laugh! hahah

well i don't much notice any of this in Progressive Music.

You don't notice it much in progressive music eh?

I notice it in bands like Spastic Ink, Spiral Architect...bands like this...there are so many great ideas in songs like Insect by Spiral Architect that could be developed more, but it's like they don't know how to play out all of these parts for more then a minute or something...so I conclude that the A.D.D aspect of progressive metal would occur more in the technical sub-genre then the melodic sub-genre...

The only band I can think of that can be classified as this would have to be Crotchduster. They change styles in a song every 15 seconds.

It's already been said but I'll say it again to emphasis how well they fit into this topic: Spiral Architect. So over the top. Some of the tracks, such as 'Fountainhead' just sound like two songs playing on top of each other. There is no logical structure at all and times signatures are changing all over the place. A lot of people say they induce headaches.

Psyopus are one of these technical bands that combine death, prog, grind and even hardcore bits to create mindfuck music. Completely erratic and hyper.

Does Cryptopsy count?

The Mars Volta can go from Latin-tinged lounge jazz to ethereal samples and even recorded bird chirps. That's pretty A.D.D. in my opinion.

i think that Death's "spirit crusher" has some really mindfuck moments, with a really high(and kinda useless) bass, and some off-rhythm drumming... i kinda hate jazzmetal
also dragonforce is kinda unpredictable, with the insanely fast harmonies(they could have 3 times as many songs with their riffs)
and i also think iced earth's stormrider album could easily have 3 more full songs with the same amount of riffs(though the album is excellent nonetheless)

I would say some avant-garde metal qualifies as serious A.D.D. metal! Try Solefald's Neonism or Sigh's Imaginary Sonicscape... hahhaaaha.... They don't even stay with metal let alone a given sub-genre... but nevertheless they are two of my favorite albums... they keep my attention...

Only thing that is falling on my mind is Canadian UneXpect... They can really mess everything in your head

@Cursed - Death? Well maybe, but never been that drunk...

Written by jupitreas on 07.02.2007 at 23:53

Fantomas.

Musical ideas on this band's albums rarely last more than 15 seconds... Thats pretty ADD to me

Hehe that's right. And teh fact of mixing teh music with cartoon samplers in "Suspended Animation" is ADD too...
In comparison with Delirivm Cordia, one song, 1 hour 15 minutes.... ADD totally.

I think most people here under a false impression. This coming from someone who actually DOES have ADHD, I have a hard time with prog, so do both my father and 2 brothers (all have ADD), the long songs cant hold our attention, even if they are changing up the song. I think ADD metal would be something more like Municipal Waste, the songs rarely last longer than 2 minutes. I think prog takes a way bigger attention span even with the change ups and everything.

Deathspell Omega's Fas sounds like 5 albums in one to me. and it is just horrible. i can't even listen to the album from start to finish.

dream theater
whitechapel
bring me the horizon
Opeth
either very long, or overly-intricate songs by all those bands

@MortalTheory: You'd think that a band that composes a long and well thought out song wouldn't have ADD...

Lots of long songs are random riffs combined.

What about the other side...

bands with monotonous yet catchy sound....

like most follower power metal and melodeath bands (note i'm saying followers, not leaders)

Written by selken on 19.07.2008 at 08:31

What about the other side...

bands with monotonous yet catchy sound....

like most follower power metal and melodeath bands (note i'm saying followers, not leaders)

ha, manowar, hammerfall, priest, etc you mean? i LOVE them lol

One band I have to nominate is Behold... The Arctopus. I got to finally see them live after being a fan ever since their first EP came out. These guys make Liquid Tension Experiment look like Doom Metal.

Soilent Green is the ultimate ADD metal band. They never (or at least rarely) repeat a riff more than 4 or times in a song. It's one riff blending right into the other and the vocalist WON'T STOP SCREAMING! That's why they're so cool.

Mr. Bungle also suffers from ADD, completely unwilling to focus into a single music genre in the same song.

Probably the main musician I've suspected to have ADHD is Varg Vikernes. His fucked up politics aside he has such an intense focus and level of productivity when it comes to music and whatever his ideology of the day happens to be its hard to think its anything but one of the positive aspects of ADHD (intense focus only things a person is interested in and difficulty focusing on anything else). But seems anything else he's completely unable to focus on. Burzum, Aske, Det som... and Hvis... came out in such rapid succession and since he's been out of prison he's been producing an album/year (or less). This isn't considering all the shit he writes and goes on about.

I can totally see Senmuth having ADHD at the rate he cranks out albums Pure ridiculousness.

Most of all metal are adhd. The musical melody changes from fast tempo to middle and slower, good for enjoy with heavily affect brain and emotion, enforce adhd, ha!