Study: 95 percent of metalheads suffer from Restless Head Syndrome

Washington, D.C. – Researchers at Georgetown University announced Friday the results of a study showing that as many as 95 percent of all heavy metal music enthusiasts worldwide suffer from a disorder called Restless Head Syndrome (RHS) – a condition characterized by an irresistible urge to repeatedly move one’s head in a violent up and down motion when listening to loud, heavy music.

“Restless Head Syndrome has affected young heavy metal music lovers for decades, but until now these folks have gone undiagnosed as suffering from an actual medical condition,” said Dr. Neil Graham, lead researcher in the study. “As a result, many of these people have desperately turned to self-medicating – mostly by ingesting large amounts of caffeine and/or alcohol – which we now know only exacerbates their symptoms.”

The Georgetown study showed that RHS mostly affects young males between the ages of 13 and 40 who listen to heavy metal music and tend to wear their hair long or styled as a mullet. Sufferers’ symptoms tend to worsen during the evening or night, with the fierce, repeated up and down motion often leading them to later suffer severe back pain, strained or pulled neck muscles, headaches or even whiplash.

“Headbangers, the slang name for RHS sufferers, are usually completely unaware that they even suffer from this illness,” said Dr. Graham.

“Just as most people who suffered from Restless Leg Syndrome (RLS) didn’t know they had a medical condition until after a remedy was developed – simply thinking they just had ‘the jimmylegs’ – RHS sufferers need to be medically diagnosed and put on a path to recovery.”

Dr. Graham said that although no medication has yet been developed to eliminate the symptoms of RHS, simple behavioral changes can ease the sufferer’s symptoms.

“Patients seeking relief from RHS need to do is stop listening to loud, aggressive heavy metal and start listening to softer, less intense styles of music,” said Dr. Graham. “Instead of rocking out to Pantera or Slayer, for example, patients should try listening at a reasonable volume to, say, George Michael or Neil Diamond or something. Barry White. Frank Sinatra. Hell, Yanni, even. Anything that doesn’t have a bunch of yelling and screaming.”

Heavy metal musicians – a group of people who the study acknowledges as being at an exceptionally increased risk of developing RHS – have largely rejected the idea that the music they create is responsible for listeners developing the symptoms of Restless Head Syndrome.

“I’ve been headbanging to loud music since I was a teenager, and I’m no worse for wear from it,” said Mick Thompson, guitarist for the heavy metal band Slipknot. Asked if the 2005 stroke incurred by Evanescence guitarist Terry Balsamo as a result of onstage headbanging worried his at all, Thompson replied: “Who cares – I hate that band.”