David Draiman

David Michael Draiman (; born March 13, 1973) is an American singer and songwriter. Noted for his distorted, operatic, baritone voice and percussive singing style, he has been the lead vocalist of heavy metal band Disturbed since 1996. He has written some of the band's most successful singles, such as "Stupify", "Down with the Sickness", "Indestructible", and "Inside the Fire". In 2006, he was ranked at No. 42 on the Hit Parader list of "Top 100 Metal Vocalists of All Time". During Disturbed's hiatus from 2011 to 2015, he worked on an industrial metal project with Geno Lenardo, which was later named Device. They released one self-titled album in 2013. Disturbed returned with the album Immortalized in 2015, Evolution in 2018, and Divisive in 2022. Early life David Michael Draiman was born to Jewish parents in the Brooklyn borough of New York City on March 13, 1973. His father, YJ, had worked as a real estate developer and small-business owner before he was arrested for embezzlement and sent to prison when Draiman was 12 years old. YJ would later become a candidate in the races for Mayor of Los Angeles in 2013, 2017, and 2022. Draiman's brother, Benjamin, is an ambient musician who lives in Israel. His grandmother Ziona is a Yemenite Jew whose family immigrated to Israel in the early 1900s. While not personally observant of their Jewish faith, Draiman's parents sent him to Orthodox schools, where he believed he was on the path to receiving rabbinic ordination. He frequently spent time in Israel during his early life. He attended five Jewish day schools, including Valley Torah High School in Los Angeles, where he formed his first band; Fasman Yeshiva High School in Skokie Illinois, a near north suburb of Chicago; and the Wisconsin Institute for Torah Study in Milwaukee. During his freshman year at the latter, he was asked to leave as he "rebelled against the conformity" and "just wanted to be a normal teenage kid", adding that he "couldn't really stomach the rigorous religious requirements of the life [there]". He has admitted to being "a bit resentful" about his time at Jewish day schools, but nevertheless became trained as a hazzan (cantor) and encouraged his family to observe Shabbat.