Djent

Primary Stylistic Influences:

• Groove Metal, Progressive Metal, Avant-Garde Metal

Secondary Stylistic Influences:

• Nu Metal, Metalcore, Melodic Death Metal, Industrial Metal, Technical Death Metal, Deathcore, Grindcore, Post-Hardcore, Electronic Music

Djent is a subgenre of heavy metal characterized by downtuned riffs, heavy grooves, polyrhythmic drumming, and irregular time signatures which became popular in the early 2010s. Later bands also added in other elements that became commonly associated with the genre, namely clean, ethereal atmospheric textures, electronic overtones, and occasionally clean singing depending on the act. Dissonance is sometimes associated with the genre in the late 2010s and early 2020s, usually in more extreme acts that may or may not use the "thall" tag^note an onomatopoeia created by Vildhjarta to describe the sound of an open note on an extended-range guitar; this was largely codified by Car Bomb and Vildhjarta in the earlier part of the decade and additionally popularized by Humanity's Last Breath in the final quarter of the decade, and most extreme djent acts with prominent dissonant death metal or post-metal elements fit within this stylistic framework. Essentially, a cross between Progressive Metal and Groove Metal.

Because djent refers to a style of guitar playing, the genre of metal largely depends on the band in question. A lot of bands sound very different from each outside of the djent guitar. For example, compare Animals as Leaders to Twelve Foot Ninja, or Periphery to Hacktivist. Though, Progressive Metal and Metalcore are the most common overlaps, Alternative Metal, Nu Metal, and Melodic Death Metal combinations are also popular.

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Bands typically considered to be Djent include:

• AERIAL
• After The Burial (also deathcore)
• The Afterimage
• The Algorithm
• Animals as Leaders
• Architects
• Aviana
• Betraying The Martyrs (also deathcore)
• Blankfield (known for doing the music for the Danmaku Unlimited games)
• Born Of Osiris (Also Deathcore and Progressive Death Metal, though they have mostly leaned towards metalcore from Tomorrow We Die ∆live onward)
• Car Bomb (w^w^^w^w/Waveform onward, also mathcore)
• Chelsea Grin (Ashes to Ashes and Self Inflicted, also metalcore and deathcore, though they have regularly flirted with this over the years)
• The Contortionist (earlier material, abandoned the genre completely in favor of prog-tinged post-hardcore on Clairvoyant)
• The Cyclamen (strong prog-metal influence, their mellower songs verge on post-hardcore)
• DEADLOCK (On The Arsonist, previous material was Melodic Death Metal.)
• Deftones (from Diamond Eyes onwards, also Avant-Garde Metal)
• Destiny Potato (a rare female-fronted example)
• DVSR (also Rap Metal)
• Earthists (also metalcore, notable ambient influence)
• Entheos (Primal, mixed with Technical Death Metal; they mostly shed this on The Infinite Nothing)
• Erra (Also has some strong Metalcore influences)
• Exotype (a strange example of this overlapping with a slew of both metal and Electronic Music genres)
• A Fine Constant
• Frontierer (also mathcore)
• Grenouer (Try and Lifelong Days before shifting to Nu Metal afterwards; prior material is Death Metal)
• Hacktivist (mixed with grime and Nu Metal)
• Haunted Shores (mixed with Alternative Metal. Also see Periphery)
• Humanitys Last Breath (mixed with deathcore and tech death. Also see Vildhjarta)
• I built the sky
• In Hearts Wake
• Intervals
• Invent Animate
• Ion Dissonance (Minus the Herd onward, also deathcore and mathcore)
• Issues (prominently on their second album, also Metalcore, Nu Metal, and Pop music)
• Jinjer (some nu metal elements)
• Krosis (also deathcore)
• Sarah Longfield (also see A Fine Constant; her solo work toes the line between djent and modern instrumental prog ala Scale the Summit, but she is ultimately rooted in djent)
• Meshuggah (Ur-Example, Trope Maker, Trope Namer and Trope Codifier)
• Monuments
• Mnemic (Overlaps with Nu Metal and Industrial)
• Myth Of I (also instrumental prog)
• Nevermore (the other Trope Maker; one of few djent bands that overlap with Power Metal)
• Northlane (early material was straightforward djent/metalcore, Alien mixes in nu-metal and rave music)
• Novelists FR (also prog and metalcore, their lightest material goes into post-hardcore)
• Ovids Withering (overlaps with deathcore and Symphonic Metal)
• Periphery (The Genre Popularizer)
• Polyphia (Though they took a hard left into Progressive Metal by their 2nd album.)
• Ravenscry (overlaps with Gothic Metal and Alternative Metal; another female-fronted example)
• Reaping Asmodeia (also deathcore)
• Jason Richardson
• Scar Symmetry (another early example rooted in Power Metal)
• SHEORU
• SikTh (early co-Trope Codifier, also Nu Metal. The Ensemble Dark Horse of the subgenre)
• Skyharbor
• Sleep Token (mixed with alternative pop and R&B)
• Spiritbox
• Dan Sugarman
• Sybreed (overlaps with Industrial and Melodic Death Metal)
• Tesseract (an incredibly rare example that only uses clean vocals; also a respected example)
• Textures (another Ensemble Dark Horse due to their unique and atmospheric sound)
• Threat Signal (Also Melodic Death Metal)
• The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza (also deathcore and mathcore)
• Twelve Foot Ninja (mixed with Funk Metal)
• Uneven Structure (mixed with Post-Metal)
• Veil Of Maya (mixed Deathcore early on-their fifth album switched to a straightfoward Djent sound)
• Vildhjarta (also avant-garde metal, see Humanity's Last Breath)
• Viscera (also deathcore and metalcore)
• Volumes (also Deathcore and Nu Metal)
• Voyager (overlaps with progressive metal on their earlier material, but Colours in the Sun mostly abandoned this for a djent/synthwave hybrid sound)
• Within the Ruins (also Deathcore and Metalcore)
• Xerath (mixed with Symphonic Metal)

Djent contains the following tropes:

• Careful with That Axe: Harsh vocals in djent often come in suddenly and with little to no forewarning, leading to surprising reactions from listeners who would otherwise expect a purely instrumental track.
• Dead Unicorn Trope: Djent bands are stereotyped as always using 8 and 9-string guitars, largely due to the influence of Meshuggah. In reality, most bands in the genre, even the earliest examples, use seven-string or conventional (albeit downtuned) six-string guitars.
  • Moreover, while there are many which refer to djent as a musical genre, djent is more accurately described as a specific style of guitar playing; the djent "sound" can vary greatly across different bands and can resemble anything from Metalcore and Progressive Metal, to more extreme and technical forms of Death Metal, Doom Metal and Avant-Garde Metal, and can even sound like conventional Groove Metal, Alternative Metal, Industrial Metal, or Nu Metal with syncopation and polyrhythms added in.
• Discredited Meme: Most bands in the genre are utterly sick of the "but will it djent?" meme.
• Epic Rocking: Many bands in the genre would write songs that can range anywhere from six to eight minutes long, with some truly long-playing tracks recorded by older bands or those with a more overtly ambient influence. Occasionally, there will be EPs or even full-length albums that are meant to be listened to as one complete song.
• Follow the Leader: One of the biggest criticisms of the genre, and even its musicians will (half-jokingly) admit to it. The stereotype of the Periphery or Animals as Leaders soundalike with a plural noun name, preppy-looking members in dress shirts, a vocalist (if the band isn't an instrumental ensemble) who is either a clean-singing Chester Bennington / Chino Moreno stand-in, or a bald, hammy, funny-faced dude whose Harsh Vocals sound like someone going through a Sanity Slippage, guitarists who use Ibanez, Kiesel or Strandberg guitars, run everything through Axe-Fx, and play a mix of chugging riffs, groovy bends, effects-laden atmospheric textures, out-of-tune legato passages, and heavily processed fusionesque leadwork, and YouTube channels that are mostly covers and Jared Dines-aping comedy sketches exists for a reason, and all but the most self-unaware djent musicians will probably laugh with you and/or offer several additional components if you bring it up.
• Friendly Fandoms: With shred. Despite the two genres' radically different approaches to musical composition, fans of djent and shred are generally on friendly terms due to a shared love of guitar playing and an emphasis on music theory, technical performance, and eclectic musicianship. Several artists such as Jeff Loomis, Per Nilsson, Devin Townsend, and Jason Richardson have produced material in both djent and shred, so there's some overlap between the two styles as well.
• Green Aesop: Bands with more of an ambient influence have this as a lyrical topic, Earthists, Invent Animate, and Aviana being the most notable. Yuto of Earthists jokingly refers to their style of music as naturecore.
• I Am the Band: In Djent, a lot of "bands" in the genre are really just one guy who can play guitar and bass using programmed drums. The genre has become rather notorious for that. Many of these one-man projects evolve into full lineups, however.
• Improv: Due to the insular nature of early djent, and the relatively simple production techniques required to make tracks, the genre as a whole is known for this. It is also notable for being a genre that can be procedurally generated with relative ease.
• Hatedom: Djent isn't look very highly upon among many metal purists, as to them, djent is just a playing style and classifying it as a separate genre doesn't make sense to them, so you won't find much bands under the "djent" category in The Metal Archives outside of few main acts, such as Meshuggah.
• Mind Screw: Djent is this in riff form.
• Miniscule Rocking: The heavier and more extreme bands of the genre would sometimes record minute-long tracks that make up for their brevity with great intensity and technical prowess.
• Soprano and Gravel: Many bands in the genre alternate between clean and harsh vocals, much like the Metalcore, Alternative Metal, and Melodic Death Metal bands they are influenced by. A few bands, notably Vildhjarta and Scar Symmetry, have dabbled with the idea of having two vocalists perform separate vocal roles.
• Special Guest: It isn't uncommon for djent musicians to borrow talent from other bands, or lend theirs to musical projects that aren't their own. Many djent bands even have surprisingly good relations with former members, and may even occasionally feature them in their more recent material.
• Techno Babble: A common trope in djent lyrics, song titles, and album naming. Often overlaps with Green Aesop themes and is most noticeable in bands with an Industrial Metal influence.
• Three Chords and the Truth: Zigzagged - the main focus of the genre is on start-stop riffs that are mostly devoid of melody, with some bands even writing entire songs with only one to three notes. But what djent riffs lack in melody, they make up for in precisely-timed picking and sheer complexity of rhythm. Many bands also add lush ambient soundscapes and even include guitar solos to break up the monotony of the polyrhythmic chugging.
• Trope Codifier - Periphery
• Trope Maker and Ur-Example - Meshuggah. Other musical acts that have left their influence on the genre include Nevermore, Scar Symmetry, Strapping Young Lad, Deftones and Mnemic.

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