Omniscience (; omniscient point-of-view in writing) is the capacity to know everything infinitely, or at least everything that can be known about a character including thoughts, feelings, life and the universe, etc. In Latin, ''omnis'' means "all" and sciens means "knowing". Omniscience is the capacity to know everything.

Definitions

There is a distinction between:

inherent omniscience - the ability to know anything that one chooses to know and can be known.

total omniscience - actually knowing everything that can be known.

Some modern theologians argue that God's omniscience is inherent rather than total, and that God chooses to limit his omniscience in order to preserve the freewill and dignity of his creatures. Certain theologians of the 16th Century, comfortable with the definition of God as being omniscient in the total sense, in order for worthy beings' abilities to choose freely, embraced the doctrine of predestination.

Controversies

Omnipotence (unlimited power) is sometimes understood to also imply the capacity to know everything that will be.

Nontheism often claims that the very concept of omniscience is inherently contradictory.

Whether omniscience, particularly regarding the choices that a human will make, is compatible with free will has been debated by theists and philosophers. The argument that divine foreknowledge is not compatible with free will is known as theological fatalism. Generally, if humans are truly free to choose between different alternatives, it is very difficult to understand how God could know what this choice will be. Various responses have been proposed to this argument. One possible solution is that God could know every possible life one might live, but allows for free will according to laws set in place that cannot be contradicted. God would know all possible ways to live and all the outcomes, but a human being with free will would choose which specific life to actually live out, one decision at a time. God would allow for the ability to choose, and to not have full power over all in what was chosen by a human being each step of the way. God would be all-knowing in terms of infinite specific details of every possible life you could live.

God created knowledge

Some theists argue that God created all knowledge and has ready access thereto. This statement invokes a circular time contradiction: presupposing the existence of God, before knowledge existed, there was no knowledge at all, which means that God was unable to possess knowledge prior to its creation. Alternately if knowledge was not a "creation" but merely existed in God's mind for all time there would be no contradiction. In Thomistic thought, which holds God to exist outside of time due to his ability to perceive everything at once, everything which God knows in his mind already exists. Hence, God would know of nothing that ''was not'' in existence (or else it would exist), and God would also know everything that ''was'' in existence (or else it would not exist), and God would possess this knowledge of what did exist and what did not exist at any point in the history of time.

The circular time contradiction can suppose anything concerning God, such as the creation of life, meaning before God created life, he wasn't alive. Moreover to assume any more attributes, to then say God is merciful, but before the creation of mercy, he wouldn't have been merciful, and before the creation of the concept of negation (meaning to assume something as not), no one would have any concept of what is not. These apparent contradictions, however, presuppose that such attributes are separately defined and detached from God Himself, which is not necessarily so. It is not a given that attributes which can be assigned to or used to describe mankind, can be equally (or even similarly) ascribed to God the Creator Himself. Take good and evil for example: goodness is biblically defined as that which is of God; it is intrinsic to His being and is revealed most prominently through His provision of Old Testament Law, the keeping of which is the very definition of goodness and the neglecting of which (on even the slightest of grounds), is the epitome of evil. A similar argument could be laid down concerning God's omniscience (i.e. knowledge). It even eludes the idea a lot more even to assume the concept of "nothing" or negation was created, therefore it is seemingly impossible to conceive such a notion where it draws down to a paradox.

To assume that knowledge in Plato's sense as described to be a belief that's true, it then means that before everything came into being, it was all to be conceived as total imagination by God until the set of truth. One verse "God created man in his own Image" states that God imagined the form of humans, taking image as a root word for imagine, mistakenly understood as man to look like God.

The above definitions of omniscience cover what is called ''propositional knowledge'' (''knowing that''), as opposed to ''experiential knowledge'' (''knowing how''). That some entity is omniscient in the sense of possessing all possible propositional knowledge does not imply that it also possesses all possible experiential knowledge. Opinions differ as to whether the propositionally omniscient God of the theists is able to possess all experiential knowledge as well. But it seems at least obvious that a divine infinite being conceived of as necessary infinitely knowledgeable would also know ''how'', for example, a finite person [man] dying feels like as He [God] would have access to all knowledge including the obvious experiences of the dying human. There is a third type of knowledge: ''practical'' or ''procedural knowledge'' (''knowing how to do''). If omniscience is taken to be ''all'' knowledge then all knowledge of all types would be fully known and comprehended.

The omniscient creating knowledge problem

There are arguments suggesting that the true cause of all causation can not be that which is slave to require a cause for its own existence, or even to know of its own existence. Thus it can be said that one can not know how to create knowledge into existence because it is slave to require it as a base of inquiry to itself. This would then violate the premise of such an entity being omniscient since it can not know how to create knowledge. This is especially true when one understands that knowledge is a body of information to which is the base of inquiry. It comes down to information itself being the principle of all principles that are seen to govern the base of all knowledge, and those that which require knowledge to be all that which they are. It is a question of where and how does something as complex as consciousness arise and exist. Here it is said that consciousness is a product to which can not exist without the base principles of causation, or to where consciousness is too complex and can not exist without cause. This comes from those exploring the idea that things to which are not conscious would require less cause to exist than those things to which are conscious. These principles have been argued in regards to information theory by those who see information itself as the cause and substance to everything. As referenced here: Information: The Material Physical Cause of Causation. These arguments also seem to argue that there are three fundamental principles to which govern all things, and all things of complex to which includes consciousness itself. These principles also seem to divide individuals to where no one individual could be Omniscient without suggesting all individuals, things, objects, or places as apart of a single mind, or seen as pure Solipsism. This is thus stating that information is the substance itself to which is the substance and base principle to everything in or of existence. Thus noted as the cause of all causation because not a single thing could seem to exist without it. And in knowing this, the base principle of information is understood to have three basic attributes commonly known as:

Positive

Negative

Neutral

These attributes come into understanding because it seems like there can only ever be a positive, negative, or neutral: piece or state of information, action, reaction, process, choice, decision, phenomenon, system, emerging property, environment, feedback, motion, moral, ethic, thought, idea, emotion, selection, response, stimuli, existence (negative not existing), capacity (negative having no capacity to contain), time, event, mathematical equation, solution, Answer, image, perception, ability, function, oscillation, inertia, belief, or energy. We can explore this through a simple example below:

Einstein said: "You can talk about the ethical foundation of science, but you can't talk about the scientific foundation of ethics." Einstein also said: "Everything in life is vibration."

Well, some information theorists might put this argument into a more clearly defined argument:

Energy has three properties:

Positive

Negative

Neutral

Ethics, or morals:

Positive

Negative

Neutral

This is where information and energy are seen as two sides of the same coin but distinctively different. Thus the philosophy of information and energy goes seems to assume that existence is seen as a phenomenal reality of physical self-oscillating, and self-organizing energy, or a Complex adaptive system that makes you, us, the stars, matter, anything with mass, or anything with consciousness possible. This principle would however require an antecedent cause as it cannot be assumed prima facie. "A universal set of all sets". Without information, it seems there can be no consciousness, no awareness, no existence, no objects, no things, no places, or entities. Information is thus conceptually conceived as a substance, but is neither matter nor energy as explained by Norbert Weiner. It's also seen under this argument that information although fundamental to existence cannot be the true cause of everything as it lacks sufficient causal efficacy. Thus all things including consciousness are seen as emerging properties not without cause. This below are a few Omniscience Paradoxes:

The Omniscience paradoxes

The Omniscience Paradox can be defined by these questions,

"Can an omniscient, omnipotent, eternal, timeless, boundless, limitless, and uncontained Entity create that which it doesn't already know?"

"If information is the substance and causation to all that exists, would an omniscient entity not literally be everything and anything in, or of existence?"

Well if such an entity is boundless and limitless to which is uncontained, its omniscience would thus need to be infinite. Thus saying it could create that which it doesn't already know makes no sense as there is nothing that such a Being does not know. A Being that is omniscient without bounds or limits would also be omnipotent, boundless and limitlessness. The seeming paradox is easily resolved when one conseders that such a Being would be Personal. In this respect, the omniscient Being would freely choose what to create and instantiate in reality. If information theory is correct, the sum of all total would be best characterized as the "contents" of the Divine Being's "mind", when the words used in quotes represent analogical terms due to the limits of human language and epistemology.

This also brings us to the question of how one can "know" how to create the following, which also seems to be the foundation of cause to our own existence. That is, how can an entity design and bring all the following listed objects or concepts into existence if information is so central to existence? The answer to this question lies in the fact that such a creative Being (i.e. omnipotence) is not merely an accumulation of 'facts' that are added to one another but rather an ontological quality that is its very nature. In this regard, any attempt to reduce such a being to a collocation of information would be false as the very Being is the actualization of the "information" comprised in the quality of omniscience. Without the Being actualizing such information as an intrinsic aspect of its very nature (not some added attribute as falsely assumed by this alleged paradox) there would be no information to begin with.

Certain religious documents as evidenced in Theological literature address attributes such as omniscience. We can explore these ideas in religious ideologies such as Christianity (as an example amongst others). In Orthodox Christianity there is a set of specific attributes to which they use to describe their God with. Among these attributes are as follows:

St John of Damascus, The Fount of Knowledge:

Abstract 1: "''The uncreate, the unoriginate, the immortal, the boundless, the eternal, the immaterial, the good, the creative, the just, the enlightening, the unchangeable, the passionless, the uncircumscribed, the uncontained, the unlimited, the indefinable, the invisible, the inconceivable, the wanting nothing, the having absolute power and authority, the life-giving, the almighty, the infinitely powerful, the sanctifying and communicating, the containing and sustaining all things, and the providing for all all these and the like He possesses by His nature. They are not received from any other source; on the contrary, it is His nature that communicates all good to His own creatures in accordance with the capacity of each.''"

Abstract 2: "''And yet again, there is His knowing of all things by a simple act of knowing. And there is His distinctly seeing with His divine, all-seeing, and immaterial eye all things at once''"

# Omniscient # Boundless # Unlimited # Uncontained # The containing and sustaining of all things # Timeless # Omnipresent

These seven attributes have been defended by many Theologians and Philosophers such as Richard Swinburn, William Craig and Donald Wacome

Omniscient syllogism from a designer's perspective (This as if you are the Omniscient Entity about to design and create something into existence, such as a human being.)

I =: reference to the designer that is contemplating creation

# I'm omniscient # I have an idea of something I want to build, construct, or make existent # I know infinitely everything about this thing, person, or place infinitely before, and infinitely after I have constructed it, or even thought of it. # I would know in my design everything it will infinitely ever do. # I would know everything about my design's essence or being to the point of actually, and literally being that of my design (object, entity, thing, or place) in every infinitely literal way. (and we must pay close attention to the term infinite) # I would know all the above infinitely in the past, present, and future. # This thing I designed would only be able to do what it was designed to do, and what I already infinitely know it will do. # Even if I wanted to state that I am only omniscient to which is knowable, 5, 6 (past, and present), and 7 would all be knowable. Omniscience would allowe the said entity I to be the source of existence itself in the best case possible and everything else being the by-product of the designer's willful activity.

In this regard, we see how an Omniscient Being creative actions actualize his omniscience and instantiate a reality that is distinct from the Being's "mind". Prior to the act of creation, all possibly created entities are said to be part of the Omniscient Being's mind. With the free act of creation, created beings are thus actualized (in the case of our world, in a physical form) and are thus distinct from their Creator. Without the act of creation, seeming paradoxes might ensue, but the Being creative action and self-limitation makes reality and individuation possible as the very act of creation is the acti of individuation itself.

Omniscience vs free will

''See : Determinism, Freewill and argument from free will''

Anterograde omniscience

Anterograde omniscience is the type of omniscience used to incorporate complete knowledge of the future into God.

A common objection towards free-will is the fact that God knows the future, and what is already known is not considered part of free-will, thus is considered predestination. Such objections however are very controversial and have been refuted by proponents of Divine Omniscience. The alleged paradox arises from a misunderstanding of Divine knowledge. The common misconception is that God predicts the future. This however is a false assumption. The Divine Being who is Eternal does not predict human actions but rather post-dicts them from the future. As such human free will is actualized without any paradoxes.

If the future was given the definition of Physics, it can be drawn down to this. The past is something that's known, the future is something that is not known but may have an infinite series of possible branched time-lines and the present is the eliminator of possibilities. God knowing the future does not determine it as his knowledge is not a deterministic process emanating from the past but rather a knowledge that exists in the present and future actualized by human free action. The future exists as a web of possibilities whose outcome is known by the Omniscient Being but not predictively from the past, but rather post-dictively from the present and future. The mistake that is often made here is to confuse the human being's understanding of his actions and of physical phenomena with the knowledge possessed by the Diving Being. The two are not the same and once this is understood, all seeming claims of paradox are resolved.

Another possible response is to state that God knows the future but does not influence it. One may posit that God knows all possible future events, meaning that he would see an infinite number of timelines laid out on a plane, and such time lines would still remain to exist even if not chosen. Such a God would know every possible way of how something was going to be. He would know all the mathematical probabilities for example of obtaining event A and would also know if a free agent like a human being would cause A to happen. By virtue of self-control God allows humans to shape and morph their lives on their own accord. This way any seeming paradoxes are resolved as one can have a world with an Omnipotent, Omniscient and Free God, while simultaneously actualizing the possibility of free agency within the created order such as that seen in human beings.

Non-theological uses

Game theory studies omniscience; here it is not necessarily advantageous if one's omniscience is known. For example, in the game of chicken, two people each drive a car towards the other. The first to swerve to avoid a collision loses. In such a game, the optimal outcome is to have your opponent swerve. The worst outcome is when nobody swerves. But if A knows that B is in fact omniscient, then A will simply decide to never swerve since A knows B will know A's logical decision and B will be forced to swerve to avoid a collision — assuming that each player is logical and follows optimal strategy.

The field of literary analysis and criticism can discuss omniscience in the point of view of a narrator. An omniscient narrator - almost always a third-person narrator - can reveal insights into characters and settings that would not be otherwise apparent from the events of the story and which no single character could be aware of.

Discussion of omniscient technology can take place with reference to a context of (say) political surveillance rather than one of theology.

The word "omniscient" characterizes a fictional character in the Devin Townsend album "Ziltoid the Omniscient".

Theological representations

The concepts of omniscience can be defined as follows (using the notation of modal logic):

:::''x is omniscient'' =_''def'' $\backslash forall\; p(p\; \backslash Rightarrow\; Kxp)$ In words, for total omniscience: :::''x is omniscient'' =_''def'' ''For all propositions p: if p (is true), then x knows that p (is true)'' For inherent omniscience one interprets Kxp in this and the following as ''x can know that p is true'', so for inherent omniscience this proposition reads: :::''x is omniscient'' =_''def'' ''For all propositions p: if p (is true), then x can know that p (is true)''

But a critical logical analysis shows that this definition is too naive to be proper, and so it must be qualified as follows:

:::''x is omniscient'' =_''def'' $\backslash forall\; p((p\; \backslash land\; \backslash Diamond\; Kp)\; \backslash Rightarrow\; Kxp)$ In words: :::''x is omniscient'' =_''def'' ''For all propositions p: if p (is true) and p is (logically) knowable, then x knows know that p (is true)''

The latter definition is necessary, because there are logically true but logically unknowable propositions such as "Nobody knows that this sentence is true":

:::''N'' = "Nobody knows that ''N'' is true"

If ''N'' is true, then nobody knows that ''N'' is true; and if ''N'' is false, then it is not the case that nobody knows that ''N'' is true, which means that somebody knows that ''N'' is true. And if somebody knows that ''N'' is true, then ''N'' is true; therefore, ''N'' is true in any case. But if ''N'' is true in any case, then it is logically true and nobody knows it. What is more, the logically true ''N'' is not only not known to be true but also impossibly known to be true, for what is logically true is impossibly false. Sentence ''N'' is a logical counter-example to the unqualified definition of "omniscience", but it does not undermine the qualified one.

Unfortunately, there are further logical examples that seem to undermine even this restricted definition, such as the following one (called "The Strengthened Divine Liar"):

:::''B'' = "God does not believe that ''B'' is true"

If ''B'' is true, then God (or any other person) does not believe that ''B'' is true and thus doesn't know that ''B'' is true. Therefore, if ''B'' is true, then there is a truth (viz. "''B'' is true") which God doesn't know. And if ''B'' is not true (= false), then God falsely believes that ''B'' is true. But to believe the falsity that ''B'' is true is to believe the truth that ''B'' is not true. Therefore, if ''B'' is not true, then there is a truth (viz. "''B'' is not true") which God doesn't know. So, in any case there is a truth that God does not and cannot know, for knowledge implies true belief.

While sentence ''N'' is a non-knower-relative unknowability, ''B'' is a knower-relative unknowability, which means that our concept of omniscience apparently needs to be redefined again:

:::''x is omniscient'' =_''def'' $\backslash forall\; p((p\; \backslash land\; \backslash Diamond\; Kxp)\; \backslash Rightarrow\; Kxp)$ In words: :::''x is omniscient'' =_''def'' ''For all propositions p: if p (is true) and p is (logically) knowable to x, then x knows know that p (is true)'

Omniscience in Buddhist India

The topic of omniscience has been much debated in various Indian traditions, but no more so than by the Buddhists. After Dharmakirti's excursions into the subject of what constitutes a valid cognition, Śāntarakṣita and his student Kamalaśīla thoroughly investigated the subject in the Tattvasamgraha and its commentary the Panjika. The arguments in the text can be broadly grouped into four sections:

The refutation that cognitions, either perceived, inferred, or otherwise, can be used to refute omniscience.

A demonstration of the possibility of omniscience through apprehending the selfless universal nature of all knowables, by examining what it means to be ignorant and the nature of mind and awareness.

A demonstration of the total omniscience where all individual characteristics (svalaksana) are available to the omniscient being.

The specific demonstration of Shakyamuni Buddha's non-exclusive omniscience.

See also

Omnibenevolence

Omnipotence

Omnipresence

Impassibility

Pantomath

Predestination

Problem of evil

Epistemology

Theory

String Theory

References

External links

Category:Social psychology Category:Self Category:Attributes of God in Christian theology

ar:علم لانهائي ca:Omnisciència de:Omniszienz es:Omnisciencia fr:Omniscience gl:Omnisciencia ia:Omniscientia nl:Alwetendheid pl:Omniscjencja pt:Onisciência ru:Всеведение sv:Allvetande zh:全知

name	Devin Townsend
background	solo_singer
birth name	Devin Garret Townsend
birth date	May 05, 1972
birth place	New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
instrument	Vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards, drum machine, sampler, banjo
genre	Extreme metal, thrash metal, industrial metal, death metal, progressive metal, progressive rock, ambient, new age
occupation	Singer-songwriter, musician, producer
years active	1993–present
associated acts	The Devin Townsend Band, The Devin Townsend Project, Strapping Young Lad, Steve Vai, Punky Brüster, IR8, Front Line Assembly, Grey Skies, Caustic Thought, Noisescapes, Ayreon, The Wildhearts
website
notable instruments	Peavey, ESP, Fender, and Gibson }}

Devin Garret Townsend (born May 5, 1972) is a Canadian musician and record producer. He was the founder, songwriter, vocalist, and guitarist in extreme metal band Strapping Young Lad from 1994 to 2007 and has had an extensive career as a solo artist.

After performing in a number of metal bands in high school, Townsend was discovered by a record label in 1993 and was asked to perform lead vocals on Steve Vai's album ''Sex & Religion''. After recording and touring with Vai, Townsend was discouraged by what he found in the music industry, and vented his anger on a solo album released under the pseudonym Strapping Young Lad. He soon assembled a band under the name, and released the critically acclaimed ''City'' in 1997. Since then, he has released three more studio albums with Strapping Young Lad, along with solo material released under his own independent record label, HevyDevy Records. Townsend's solo albums, a diverse mix of hard rock and progressive metal, have featured a varying lineup of supporting musicians. In 2002 he formed The Devin Townsend Band, a dedicated lineup which recorded and toured for two of his solo releases.

In 2007, Townsend disbanded both Strapping Young Lad and The Devin Townsend Band, taking a break from touring to spend more time with his family. After a two-year hiatus, he began work on a four-album series called The Devin Townsend Project, with each album written in a different style. The first two entries in the series, ''Ki'' and ''Addicted'', were released in 2009. Townsend scheduled tours throughout Australia and North America in 2010 in support of the albums, and released the next two, ''Deconstruction'' and ''Ghost'', in 2011.

Townsend's trademark production style, featuring a heavily multitracked wall of sound, has been compared to the styles of Phil Spector and Frank Zappa. His versatile vocal delivery ranges from screaming to an opera-esque singing, and his songwriting is similarly diverse. Townsend's musical style is rooted in metal, and his albums are written to express different aspects of his personality.

Biography

Early musical career (1972–1996)

Devin Townsend was born in New Westminster, British Columbia, on May 5, 1972. Townsend picked up the banjo when he was five, and began playing guitar when he was 12. He participated in several metal bands while he was in high school, and founded Grey Skies at the age of 19. Around the same time he joined a popular local group called Caustic Thought, replacing Jed Simon on guitar and playing alongside bassist Byron Stroud, both of whom would later become members of Townsend's flagship band, Strapping Young Lad. In 1993, Townsend began writing material under the name Noisescapes, a project he later described as "just as violent as Strapping Young Lad".

Townsend recorded a Noisescapes demo and sent copies to various record labels. Relativity Records responded to Townsend with a record deal and Townsend began work on what was to be the first Noisescapes album, ''Promise''. Shortly afterward, the label introduced him to musician Steve Vai. Impressed with Townsend's vocal work, Vai offered him the role of the lead vocalist on his new album ''Sex and Religion''. Townsend took the offer, unfamiliar with Vai's work and unaware of his acclaim in the music world. After recording ''Sex and Religion'', Townsend accompanied Vai on a world tour in support of the album. Townsend soon landed a second touring gig, this time with the opening band of Vai's tour, The Wildhearts. He played live with the band throughout half of 1994 in Europe, and appeared as a guest musician on their single Urge. Ginger, the band's frontman, remained close friends with Townsend, later co-writing several songs on ''Infinity'' and the ''Christeen + 4 Demos'' EP.

While on tour with The Wildhearts, Townsend formed a short-lived thrash metal project with Metallica's then-bassist Jason Newsted. The band, known as IR8, featured Newsted on vocals and bass, Townsend on guitar, and Tom Hunting of Exodus on drums. The group recorded a few songs together, although Townsend says that they never intended to go further than that. "People heard about it and thought we wanted to put out a CD, which is absolutely not true," he explains. "People took this project way too seriously." A demo tape was put together, but the material was not released until 2002, when Newsted published the IR8 vs. Sexoturica compilation.

Though Townsend was proud of what he had accomplished so early in his career, he was discouraged by his experience with the music industry. "I was becoming a product of somebody else's imagination, and it was mixing with my own personality," he later reflected. "This combination was appalling." He pushed to get his own projects off the ground. Despite getting notable touring gigs with other musicians, however, Townsend continued to face rejection of his own music. Relativity Records dropped Noisescapes from their label shortly after Townsend accepted Vai's offer, seeing no commercial appeal in Townsend's music. "I have a hunch they only offered me a deal to get me to sing with Steve," he mused. While touring with The Wildhearts, Townsend received a phone call from an A&R; representative for Roadrunner Records, expressing an interest in his demos and an intention to sign him. The offer was ultimately rescinded by the head of Roadrunner, who regarded Townsend's recordings as "just noise".

In 1994, Century Media Records offered Townsend a contract to make "some extreme albums". and began to record material under the pseudonym Strapping Young Lad. Townsend avoided using his real name at this point in career, looking for a fresh start after his high-profile Vai gig. "At the beginning, I wanted to avoid at all cost to use my name because I was known as the singer for Steve Vai and it wasn't the best publicity to have," he later explained. "I was playing somebody else's music and I was judged in respect to that music." Townsend produced and performed nearly all the instruments on the debut studio album, ''Heavy as a Really Heavy Thing'', which was released in April 1995. Following the release of the record, Townsend and several other musician friends he knew in Vancouver recorded an album in 1996 entitled ''Cooked on Phonics'' for another one-off side project, Punky Brüster. Written and recorded in under a month, the album was produced as a parody of punk rock bands and documents the act of selling out for mainstream success.

Devin also provided much of the guitar work on the 1994 album Millennium and the 1995 album Hard Wired by Vancouver industrial band Front Line Assembly.

''City'' through ''Infinity'' (1996–1998)

Townsend assembled a permanent lineup of Strapping Young Lad to record ''City'', including prolific metal drummer Gene Hoglan, along with Townsend's former bandmates Jed Simon on guitar and Byron Stroud on bass. The industrial-influenced album was released in 1997. To this day, the album is widely considered Strapping Young Lad's best work, with ''Metal Maniacs'' calling it "groundbreaking" and ''Revolver'' naming it "one of the greatest metal albums of all time". Townsend himself considers it the band's "ultimate" album. Later that year, Townsend released his first solo album, ''Ocean Machine: Biomech''. The album featured a mix of hard rock, ambient, and progressive rock. Townsend founded his own independent record label, HevyDevy Records, to release the album.

After the completion of ''City'' and ''Biomech'', Townsend began to approach a mental breakdown. "I started to see human beings as little lonesome, water based, pink meat," he explained, "life forms pushing air through themselves and making noises that the other little pieces of meat seemed to understand." In 1997, he checked himself into a mental-health hospital, where he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. The diagnosis helped him understand where the two sides of his music were coming from; he felt his disorder "gave birth to the two extremes that are Strapping's ''City'' record and Ocean Machine's ''Biomech''." After being discharged from the hospital, Townsend found that "everything just clicked" and he was able to write his second solo album, ''Infinity'', which he described as "the parent project" of ''City'' and ''Biomech'', with music influenced by Broadway. Townsend returned to the studio, accompanied by Hoglan, to work on the album, on which Townsend played most of the instruments. ''Infinity'' was released in October 1998. Later in his career, Townsend has cited ''Infinity'' as his favorite solo record.

With ''Infinity'', Townsend began to label all albums outside of Strapping Young Lad under his own name, dropping the Ocean Machine moniker, to reduce confusion. He wanted to show that despite the highly varied nature of his projects, they are all simply aspects of his identity. The album ''Biomech'' was relabeled and redistributed as ''Ocean Machine: Biomech'', under Townsend's name, to reflect the new arrangement. Townsend's bandmates began to play two sets at their shows, one as Strapping Young Lad, and one as The Devin Townsend Band, playing songs from Townsend's solo albums.

''Physicist'' and ''Terria'' (1999–2001)

Townsend's next project took several years to come to fruition. After the creation of the IR8 demo tape, Townsend and Jason Newsted had begun work on a new project called ''Fizzicist'', which they described as "heavier than Strapping Young Lad". When the IR8 tape was leaked, Newsted's Metallica bandmates James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich learned of the project. Hetfield was "fucking pissed" that Newsted was playing outside the band, and Newsted was prevented by his bandmates from working on any more side projects. With the project stalled, Townsend instead wrote the album himself, entitling it ''Physicist''. Townsend assembled his Strapping Young Lad bandmates to record it, the only time this lineup was featured on a Devin Townsend album. The thrash-influenced ''Physicist'' was released in June 2000, and is generally considered a low point in Townsend's career. Hoglan and the rest of the band were dissatisfied with the way the sound was mixed, and Townsend considers it his worst album to date.

Feeling he had "ostracized a bunch of fans" with ''Physicist'', Townsend felt he had the chance to make a more personal and honest record. Townsend was inspired one morning while driving across Canada with his band, and looked to write an "introspective" album dedicated to his homeland. He produced and recorded ''Terria'', a "highly illustrated stream-of-consciousness" album, with Gene Hoglan on drums, Craig McFarland on bass and Jamie Meyer on keyboards. Townsend cited Ween's ''White Pepper'' as an inspiration for the album. ''Terria'' was released in November 2001.

''Strapping Young Lad'' through ''Synchestra'' (2003–2006)

Townsend's solo run lasted until 2002. After a five-year break from recording, Strapping Young Lad reunited to record a new album. Townsend credits the album, ''Strapping Young Lad'', as an emotional response to the attacks of September 11, 2001, in the United States. "If the world's about to blow up," said Townsend, "let's write the soundtrack for it." The album's lyrics were based more around fear and insecurity than the "hostile" lyrics of ''City''. Musically, ''Strapping Young Lad'' was less industrial than ''City'', and more reminiscent of death metal, with a "larger-than-life" rock production style. Townsend cited Front Line Assembly, Grotus, and Samael's ''Passage'' as influences. The self-titled album was released in February 2003. It received lukewarm reviews, with critics finding it inferior to ''City'', but it was the band's first charting album, entering at 97th place on Billboard's Top Heatseekers chart.

While Strapping Young Lad was being reunited, Townsend formed a new, permanent band "on par with Strapping" to record and tour for his solo releases. The Devin Townsend Band consisted of Brian Waddell on guitar, Mike Young on bass, Ryan Van Poederooyen on drums, and Dave Young on keyboards. Townsend performed guitar, vocals, and production, as he did in Strapping Young Lad. Townsend worked on the band's first album, ''Accelerated Evolution'', at the same time he was working on ''Strapping Young Lad'', spending half the week on one and half on the other. ''Accelerated Evolution'', named for the pace of putting a new band together in under a year, was released a month after ''Strapping Young Lad''. Mike G. of ''Metal Maniacs'' called it "the album of the year", praising it for "the hard-to-accomplish trick of being extreme yet accessible, simultaneously heavy 'n' rockin' yet majestic and beautiful." Prior to the formation of The Devin Townsend Band, Townsend had represented his solo releases live with the Strapping Young Lad lineup; the band would play one set of Strapping Young Lad songs and one set of Devin Townsend songs. After the release of ''Accelerated Evolution'', Townsend's two bands toured separately for their separate albums.

Strapping Young Lad began working on their next album, ''Alien'', in March 2004. Feeling that the band's previous album did not live up to expectations, Townsend decided to take his music to a new extreme. To prepare for the new album, Townsend stopped taking the medication prescribed to treat his bipolar disorder. "I think that as an artist, in order for me to get to the next plateau, I kind of feel the need to explore things and sometimes that exploration leads you to places that are a little crazy," he explains. "And ''Alien'' was no exception with that." Although Townsend considered the album an "impenetrable mass of technicality", it was well received on its release, selling 3,697 copies in its first week and appearing on several Billboard charts.

Shortly thereafter Townsend began putting together the next Devin Townsend Band record, with the working title ''Human''. Townsend intended the album as the more "pleasant" counterpart to ''Alien''. "It's basically a record about coming back down to earth after being in space with ''Alien'' for a while." The album ended up being renamed ''Synchestra'' and was released in January 2006. Townsend showcased a wide variety of musical styles in ''Synchestra'', blending his trademark "pop metal" with influences from folk, polka, and Middle Eastern music.

''Ziltoid'' and hiatus (2006–2008)

Townsend's wife, Tracy Turner, gave birth to their first son, Reyner Liam Johnstan Townsend, on October 4, 2006. Around this time, Townsend withdrew from touring to spend time with his family. From home, Townsend completed his second solo ambient album, ''The Hummer'', releasing it exclusively on his website in November 2006.

In May 2007, Townsend released ''Ziltoid the Omniscient'', a tongue-in-cheek rock opera about the eponymous fictional alien. This was truly a solo album; he programmed the drums using Drumkit from Hell, a software drum machine that uses MIDI samples recorded by Tomas Haake of Meshuggah Shortly after the album's release, Townsend announced that he no longer planned to tour or make albums with Strapping Young Lad or The Devin Townsend Band. He explained that he was "burnt out on travelling, touring, and self promotion" and wished to do production work, write albums, and spend time with his family without the stress of interviews or touring.

In 2008, Townsend lent his voice to characters in several episodes of the Adult Swim cartoon ''Metalocalypse'' (see Musician cameos in ''Metalocalypse'' for more). The original character design for Pickles the Drummer, one of the series' main characters, bore a striking resemblance to Townsend. The series' co-creator Brendan Small acknowledged the similarity, and altered the design before the series began. "We made sure he didn't look like Devin Townsend. We gave him the goatee and the dreadover so he wouldn't look like that."

The Devin Townsend Project (2008–present)

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 called The 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, was written to "set the stage" for the subsequent albums. Townsend channeled his newfound control and sobriety into ''Ki'', a "tense, quiet" album that contrasts with much of the music he had been known for. ''Ki'' was released in May 2009. The second entry, a "commercial, yet heavy" album called ''Addicted'', was released in November 2009.

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.

The final albums in The Devin Townsend Project series, Deconstruction and Ghost were released on June 21, 2011.

Townsend is to perform all four of The Devin Townsend Project albums in the UK and record them for release in a special DVD to coincide with the release of The Devin Townsend Project boxset. The first two shows have been confirmed to be held at Union Chapel in Islington on November 10 and November 13 where he will be playing the albums Ki and Ghost respectively. These four shows will each be entitled "An Evening With The Devin Townsend Project".

Since 2009, Townsend has discussed plans to expand the ''Ziltoid the Omniscient'' franchise. His ideas included a sequel album, a "full blown musical" with the title ''Z²'', but the album appeared to have been scrapped, as Townsend stated in mid-June 2011, "I’m very rapidly realizing that humor and metal… it doesn’t really work." However, as of July 2011, he has stated on his Twitter account that the album was still in the works, but was "vying for pole-position" as he works on other projects. He has expressed possible plans to begin a series of online videos, a series titled ''ZTV'', instead, in which a Ziltoid hand puppet conducts interviews with various bands. A graphic novel based on the Ziltoid character, and possibly performing the ''Ziltoid'' album as a staged musical, at least as a one-off, have also been considered.

Townsend has stated on his Twitter that he is working on a new album, entitled "Epicloud". He described the album as "Big, heavy, romantic kind of melodic stuff. Pretty, ethereal and simple."

Musical style

Projects

Townsend designed his two main projects, the aggressive Strapping Young Lad and his more melodic solo material, as counterparts. Strapping Young Lad's music was a diverse mix of extreme metal genres; death metal, thrash metal, black metal and industrial metal. Townsend's solo material blends many genres and influences, with elements of atmospheric ambient music, hard rock and progressive rock, along with pop metal and arena rock. Despite Strapping Young Lad's greater mainstream acceptance, Townsend identifies more with his solo material, and has never intended Strapping Young Lad to be the focus of his music.

Production style

As a self-proclaimed "fan of multitracking", Townsend has developed a trademark production style featuring an atmospheric, layered "wall of sound". Townsend has drawn critical praise for his productions, which "are always marked by a sense of adventure, intrigue, chaotic atmospherics and overall aural pyrotechnics", according to Mike G. of ''Metal Maniacs''. Townsend mainly uses Pro Tools to produce his music, alongside other software suites such as Steinberg Cubase, Ableton Live, and Logic Pro. Townsend's musical ideas and production style have drawn comparisons to Phil Spector and Frank Zappa. Townsend has carried out the mixing and mastering for most of his solo work himself. He has also mixed and remixed work for other artists such as Rammstein.

Playing style

Townsend mainly uses Open C tuning for both six and seven string guitar. He now also uses Open B tuning and Open B flat tuning (Open C tuning tuned a half and a whole step down respectively) on his six string guitars. Townsend's technique varies from fingerpicking, power chords and polychords to sweep-picked arpeggios and tapping techniques. He is also known for his heavy use of reverb and delay effects. He has expressed that he has no taste for shred guitar, saying that "Musically it doesn't do anything for me" and that he only solos when he thinks that he can within the context of the song.

Influences

Townsend draws influence from a wide range of music genres, most prominently heavy metal. Townsend has cited, among others, Judas Priest, W.A.S.P., Frank Zappa, Broadway musicals, Abba, new age music, Zoviet France, King's X, Morbid Angel, Barkmarket, Grotus, Jane's Addiction, Metallica, Cop Shoot Cop and Fear Factory as his influences, and has also expressed his admiration for Meshuggah on several occasions, calling them "the best metal band on the planet". ''City'' was influenced by bands such as Foetus and Cop Shoot Cop, | rowspan="1"| September 2011 |}

;Strapping Young Lad {|class="wikitable" ! Title ! Release date ! Label |- | ''Heavy as a Really Heavy Thing'' | April 4, 1995 | rowspan="5"| Century Media |- | ''City'' | February 11, 1997 |- | ''Strapping Young Lad'' | February 11, 2003 |- | ''Alien'' | March 22, 2005 |- | ''The New Black'' | July 11, 2006 |- |}

References

External links

HevyDevy Records

Devin Townsend at YouTube

Category:1972 births Category:Living people Category:People from New Westminster Category:People with bipolar disorder Category:Musicians from Vancouver Category:Canadian rock guitarists Category:Canadian rock singers Category:Canadian record producers Category:Canadian singer-songwriters Category:Canadian people of English descent Category:Canadian multi-instrumentalists Category:Progressive metal guitarists Category:Ableton Live users

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