“Fear” by Disturbed

"Fear" comes off The Sickness, the debut album Disturbed released through Giant and Reprise on March 7, 2000, and like everything on it, it arrived only after a band formed in 1994 had spent years grinding away as a local act. David Draiman, Dan Donegan, Fuzz and Mike Wengren wrote it together, and the band co-produced it with Johnny K, who also engineered, before Andy Wallace and Steve Sisco mixed it.

The sound is tight and armored: Draiman out front, Fuzz on bass, Wengren on drums, and Donegan pulling double duty on guitar and electronics, which lends the heavy metal crunch a chilly, synthetic sheen. Draiman has pushed back on the idea that the band shot up overnight; by his telling, the rise was built by hand, with members fanning out across town to push cassettes, stickers and shirts at every rock show that came through.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz.