10 Unforgettable Meshuggah Moments

There’s no band on earth like Meshuggah and there never will be. The hyper-technical extreme trailblazers mixed groove, tech death, thrash and free jazz into a digital monstrosity of its own creation… now widely known as djent. To celebrate the Swedish band, we put together these 10 Unforgettable Meshuggah Moments.

In their thirty years, Meshuggah have made plenty of stylistic shifts, and we made sure to highlight the most noteworthy. The oldest footage in this Loud List is from 1990 with a performance of “Cadaverous Mastication.” You can hear ‘Shuggah’s sound develop with “Sickening” in 1996 and, of course, “Bleed” from Meshuggah’s explosive 2008 obZen album.

Even hardcore Meshuggah fans may not know that both drummer Tomas Haake and guitarist Fredrik Thordendal suffered serious hand injuries just months apart. Haake still bares scars from a workshop accident, which took off pieces of multiple fingers, ripping off nails as well. As for Thordendal, he got the Tony Iommi treatment, severing a fingertip and leaving his middle finger the same length as his index finger.

As for vocalist Jens Kidman, he spoke about the band’s solid relationship during the obZen era. “We have like no fights,” Kidman said. “It would be really hard if Tomas decided to stop playing or I stopped or whoever. To put a new member in there would feel weird, I think we would probably stop playing.” Thankfully, Meshuggah just put out one of the strongest albums of their career, The Violent Sleep of Reason, and show no signs of slowing down.

Check out these 10 Unforgettable Meshuggah Moments in the Loud List above.

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