Canadian progressive metal singer and guitarist Devin Townsend has been referred to in the rock press as a "multi-everythingist"; in addition to being a celebrated instrumentalist, he is a composer, producer, arranger, and bandleader. While his earliest recorded work was as a vocalist with Steve Vai's band on Sex & Religion, he also worked with Front Line Assembly and Skinny Puppy and led his own extreme metal group, Strapping Young Lad. His solo work since 1997's rocking sci-fi opus, Ocean Machine (Biomech), has been hotly debated in extreme music circles. His undeniably progressive, shape-shifting conceptual outfit the Devin Townsend Project is perhaps the best-known of his outlets, with unified, accessible, and provocative projects that have all been readily embraced by the metal and prog-rock communities.