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Nov 17, 20225 min read

Devin Townsend Project - Addicted (2009)

FROM THE CRYPTS - CELEBRATING PAST ALBUM RELEASES in the HISTORY of HARD ROCK & HEAVY METAL…



On November 17, 2009, the Devin Townsend Project released the second album in the Devin Townsend Project series (the twelfth studio album by Canadian musician Devin Townsend overall).


The album was released via Townsend's independent record label HevyDevy Records. The album was written and produced by Townsend, and features Ryan Van Poederooyen, Brian Waddell, Mark Cimino, and Anneke Van Giersbergen.



Background :

After removing himself from the music industry, Townsend cut his trademark hair off and gave up drinking and smoking. Townsend found it "disconcerting" that he had difficulty writing music without drugs, and that he had trouble identifying his purpose as a musician. He spent a year producing albums in absence of writing, but found it unrewarding and decided to "pick up the guitar and just write". This began a period of "self discovery" where he learned "how to create without drugs".



Over two years, Townsend wrote over 60 songs, and found that they fit into "four distinct styles". In March 2009, Townsend announced his plans for a four-album series (which eventually turned into a seven album series) called Devin Townsend Project, with the goal of clarifying his musical identity and being "accountable" for the persona he projects to the public. The project's concept includes a different "theme" and a different group of musicians on each album.


Ki, the first album of the Devin Townsend Project tetralogy was written to "set the stage" for the subsequent albums. Townsend channeled his new-found control and sobriety into Ki.


Addicted is the second of (the now) seven albums in the Devin Townsend Project series, each featuring a different lineup and theme. A "commercial, yet heavy" album, Addicted was written and produced by Townsend. The album features vocals by Townsend along with Anneke van Giersbergen, former singer of Dutch band theGathering. Brian Waddell and Ryan Van Poederooyen (of the former Devin Townsend Band) play bass and drums, respectively, while Mark Cimino plays guitar alongside Townsend. Recording for the album began May 6, 2009.



According to Townsend, Addicted is an album of "melodic" and "danceable" music but is "much heavier" than his previous albums. Townsend has compared the album's songwriting to his more accessible songs, such as Life from Ocean Machine: Biomech (1997), Stagnant from Terria (2001), and Material from Physicist (2000). The album's production style was directly influenced by Nickelback's 2008 album Dark Horse. Townsend has quipped that "Some parts of it sound like Meshuggah, some parts of it sound like Boney M." Addicted includes a new version of the song Hyperdrive from Townsend's album Ziltoid the Omniscient (2007), with lead vocals by van Giersbergen, who has performed a cover of the song with her former band Agua de Annique. Resolve! was "directly influenced by The Wildhearts" and it bears a resemblance to Vanilla Radio from The Wildhearts Must Be Destroyed. Unlike Townsend's previous albums, which were usually in open C tuning, most of the songs on Addicted were played in open B tuning. Universe in a Ball! was played in open B♭, Hyperdrive! in open C♯ (to accommodate the vocal range of van Giersbergen, as opposed to the version of Hyperdrive that appeared on the album Ziltoid the Omniscient which was recorded in C), and Ih-Ah! and The Way Home! in open C.


As noted earlier, Addicted was released on Townsend's independent record label HevyDevy Records on November 17, 2009, through their website. Pre-orders went on sale October 6, 2009, with special-edition packages through Century Media's CM Distro website. The album was released on November 13, 2009, in Germany, November 16, 2009, in the rest of Europe, and November 17, 2009, in North America by InsideOut Music. It was released in Japan through Marquee/Avalon on December 16, 2009.


The album features art by Travis Smith, who created the album art for Townsend's previous albums Terria and Accelerated Evolution. The InsideOut releases are sold in a slipcase bearing Smith's Devin Townsend Project logo.


(InsideOut Music Slipcase Edition)


Supporting Tour:

In support of Addicted, Townsend returned to the stage in January 2010, touring North America with headliner Between The Buried And Me as well as Cynic and Scale the Summit. This was followed by a headlining tour in Australia and a series of high-profile shows in Europe (for example co-headlining the Brutal Assault festival in Czech Republic). He headlined a North American tour with UK label mates TesseracT supporting, which began in October 2010, and toured in Europe with support from Aeon Zen and Anneke van Giersbergen.



Critical Reception:

Addicted received very high praise from critics and fans alike upon its release. In his review for AllMusic, Phil Freeman wrote;

“Devin Townsend's maniacal/wacky tendencies duel with his instinct for skull-crushing heaviness on Addicted, the second in a planned trilogy of albums he's put together since retiring his ultimate metal band, Strapping Young Lad, a few years back. Anneke van Giersbergen, formerly of the Gathering, is Townsend's vocal partner throughout much of the album, creating a Lacuna Coil-esque effect as he roars and she croons and the guitar riffs ride almost disco/techno rhythms. Bend It Like Bender is a particularly weird blend of metal and Hi-NRG, something Rammstein might come up with after a weekend of carousing in Berlin's most flamboyant discos. Other tracks, like Supercrush and the mostly acoustic Ih-Ah, offer a kind of anthemic pop crunch that could rocket up the charts in an alternate universe. When he's not screaming his lungs out, Townsend is a hell of a singer, and his voice intertwines with van Giersbergen's in a very European way -- many of Addicted's songs have the feel of a metallic Ace of Base, and that's not actually a bad thing. But then there's a song like Numbered or the nearly ten-minute album closer, Awake, to smash the listener's skull to powder all over again.”

Beyond Addicted:

The third and fourth albums in the Devin Townsend Project series, Deconstruction and Ghost, were released simultaneously on June 21, 2011. In December 2011 all four Devin Townsend Project albums with additional material were released as the Contain Us box set.


(Contain Us Box Set)


Despite the Devin Townsend Project being originally a four-album series, Townsend decided to continue working under the moniker and released the fifth album, Epicloud on September 18, 2012. The final two releases in the Townsend Project series were Z2: Sky Blue (October 27, 2014), and Transcendence (September 9, 2016).


Live Performances:

Townsend performed the first four of the Devin Townsend Project albums in London and recorded them for a DVD box set called By a Thread: Live in London 2011 that was released on June 18, 2012. The first three shows were held at the University of London Union, November 10–12, 2011. “Ki”, “Addicted”, and “Deconstruction” were each performed on one night, respectively. The show for “Ghost” was held at the Union Chapel, Islington on November 13, 2011. These four shows were each entitled An Evening with the Devin Townsend Project.



On October 27, 2012, Townsend performed a one-off show covering his musical career called The Retinal Circus at Roundhouse in London. The 3-hour performance was recorded in high definition and released on DVD and Blu-ray on September 30, 2013.



Note: The reviews shared here are for historical reference. The views and opinions expressed within are not always supported (in full or in part) by Into the Wells. — E.N. Wells



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