Musicians who have (or may have?) Asperger's Syndrome.

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This is a long thread, and I don't know everyone who has or has not been discussed. More of an actor than a Musician but Dan Akroyd (AKA Elwood J Blues) is diagnosed with asperger's syndrome.

And now for my guess: Tuomas Holopainen the songwriter and keyboardist for Nightwish

Evidence: Lyrics of outcasts are common is music, but Tuomas repeats the same words and phrases across multiple songs over years.

1998, Devil & the Deep Dark Ocean: "Welcome to the end of your life, Hail the Oceanborn!"

2015, Sudder Before The Beautiful: "Awake Oceanborn, Behold this Force"

1997, Angels Fall First: "Oh Lord Why the Angels Fall First"

2003, End of All Hope: "Angels they fell first, but I'm still here"

This is even more prominent comparing within albums as songs often reference each other titles. For a symphonic metal band it's not unusual to have themed albums, but what sells me is the same words and phrases over long stretches of time. If you want to get drunk real fast drink everytime you hear the word "wish" in an early nightwish album or "awe" in a late nightwish album.

Second is his intense relationship with music. He suffered a period of extreme depression and anxiety (often co-morbid with AS) and has described writing Dark Passion Play as saving his life. His music is complex and intricate, and he has described a great love for movie scores.

Lastly, for being the musical mastermind behind Nightwish he lets Marco and Tarja/Annette/Floor do most of the front work for the band. Perhaps because he does not feel comfortable in social situations or being the focus of attention.

Obviously this is just a guess, but I think it is a decent one.

No, he was not.
Dan Aykroyd Was NOT Officially Diagnosed - Wrong Planet thread

Good to know. Although my statement is technically correct as I merely stated he is diagnosed not professionally or officially.

Varg Vikernes

Are you an Eminem fan. I am a huge Stan. Have all of his albums on CD. I've did the research as well, thinking maybe he has Asperger's. I know on a few songs he has said he has it, such as Wicked Ways from the Marshall Mathers LP 2. That being said, I know he has also said he has OCD, which does present some Asperger's-like symptoms, and it also is commonly present along OCD. I also have read this interesting article about how he maybe has BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder): https://medium.com/@KevinRedmayne/does- ... 76c396f995

I'm a fan, but not to that extent. I just have the albums that came out when I was in high school. SSEP, SSLP, MMLP.

I'm also a Cage fan, and can absolutely see why Cage feels Eminem bit his style, especially on the SSEP.

Steven Patrick Morrissey seems to fit the bill. His bio was the indie movie England is Mine.

Why would you list Morrissey's full name? Doing so actually makes him less easily recognizable. There have been other famous people with the surname Morrissey (like Andy Warhol's filmmaker, Paul Morrissey), but none of them went by just Morrissey.

Steven Patrick Morrissey

You named him already, as well as already got called out for referring to him by the name that's less likely to be connected to him. This is the same reason I said Ol' Dirty Bastard, Cage and Eminem instead of Russell Jones, Christian Palko and Marshall Mathers.




This artist is typically known as Morrissey, he's mononymous.

All I know about him was in the movie and the bio from the movie database.

I am unsubscribing to notifications in this topic.

Steve Lukather from Toto is for sure on the spectrum. He's extremely quirky and one of his children is officially diagnosed.

Jeff Lynne of ELO would be high up on the suspected aspie list. He remixed the ELO albums with him playing every instrument so they sounded right. That's what I would do. I have my suspicions about brendan urie from Panic! At the disco and Trent Reznor from NIN too.

It does not seem he has done through research into autism and seems to only to identify with social awkwardness.

So yeah MAYBE.

I have no idea if anybody uses this website anymore; in fact, I have no idea what it even is. [EDIT: Okay, I looked around a little bit. Seems cool here.] I literally just made this account to post a reply to this thread, because I need to get this out somewhere people might understand:

I am 110% convinced Tony Banks of Genesis is autistic.

- He doesn’t sugarcoat; he’s very upfront about his opinions on his and his band members’ past work, to the point where the general public see him as a bit of an as*hole for voicing the negative ones so often, but he has a very logical explanation behind each of his opinions, positive or negative.

- Another reason he gets perceived as an as*hole is his facial expressions. Go to the comments section of any interview with him and I guarantee you’ll find at least one “[timestamp] Did Tony Banks just smile????” comment. But if you watch a lot of interviews, you’ll find he actually smiles pretty often — he just has the world’s worst case of RBF, a pretty classic autie thing.

- He really hates surprises. It’s pretty well-documented that Peter Gabriel’s antics (“singing over [Tony’s] bit,” appearing on stage in a fox head and red dress without running it by Tony first, etc.) and Tony’s angry reactions to them comprised a majority of the tension and drama in the band’s early days. I’m also reminded of that one interview from 2007 where Peter says something along the lines of “Any creative person wants to push themselves and go outside the box” and Tony cuts in, “Speak for yourself!”

- He’s got a near-encyclopedic memory of Genesis’ history. No matter how many decades have passed, he can talk about details and dates of old events like they happened last week. Watch his segments of the 2007 Genesis interviews to see what I’m talking about. (Funnily enough, it’s almost exactly the same way I talk about Genesis’ history — and I wasn’t even alive for most of it!)

- He considers himself a rather reserved person (or in his words, “I don’t bite the heads off chickens”) and gets stressed out by interviews. He also doesn’t care much for the performing side of his career — he doesn’t mind it per se, but when playing on stage he considers himself more of a spectator to the whole event. Hell, he didn’t even intend on becoming a performer in the first place; Genesis was originally just meant to be a songwriting collective.

- As a kid, he learned to pick out songs on piano by ear — not just hits (although he was fascinated with the top 10), but pieces written by the likes of his favorite composers Rachmaninoff and Ravel, too.

- His lyrics tend to be pretty straightforward — plenty of moving stories, but written in very grounded and literal terms. And when they’re not strictly stories, they often get rather analytical and logically philosophical.

- Speaking of which, before joining Genesis, Tony was studying mathematics, physics, and philosophy at university.

- As far as keyboards go, he was a self-described “stiff player” in the band’s early days, and though he loosened up a bit over time, he still retained a penchant for repetitive techniques, the best example of which I can think of is the song “Keep It Dark” off Abacab (1981).

- He often sits funny, fidgets, even rocks a little sometimes. And as far as moving to music goes, the Tony Banks Head Bop oughta be patented. Also, his spacial perception is a little sus — I’m reminded of the clip where he’s trying to work out the rhythm of “Second Home by the Sea” and he whacks Mike Rutherford in the face with a pen without even noticing.

- He’s got a fear of flying because “if you stop thinking about it, the plane goes down” — this gives me OCD vibes, and OCD has a lot of overlap with ASD.

- His debut solo album, A Curious Feeling, is a concept album based on the story Flowers for Algernon, which is about a janitor with a low IQ who undergoes an experimental scientific procedure that temporarily gives him a high IQ, and he’s a genius for a while, but gradually his intellect dwindles till he’s right back where he started. If an autistic person wouldn’t relate to that so hard they’re inspired to make a concept album about it, I dunno who would.

- I haven’t even mentioned the unadventurous sweaters thing or the being soothed by gardening thing but I’ve been writing this post for way too long and I have to go to bed soon, so I’ll leave you with this quote:

- “He was a really awkward bastard.” -Peter Gabriel, 2007





(Sorry for the essay lol; I just found out I’m autistic a couple weeks ago [I’m 21], and suddenly it makes so much more sense why I’ve been so fixated on Genesis and Tony Banks since I first discovered them at age 16.)

Welcome, turnleftaticela!

I have never heard of Tony Banks or Genesis, but it always makes me happy to see someone enjoying a good infodump.