14 DAY TRIAL // Not that fans need any further proof that this is indeed the case, but, as it turns out, Motörhead might just be the most hardcore rock band ever. Thus, doctors now claim that these guys' music can literally make people's brains bleed.
In a report published in a recent issue of The Lancer, specialists with the Hannover Medical School in Germany detail the case of a man who presented to hospital with a chronic subdural hematoma, i.e. bleeding in the brain.
After carrying out a series of tests and questioning the patient about his pastime activities, it was discovered that the man developed the hematoma while attending a Motörhead concert some 4 weeks prior to asking for medical help.
More precisely, the doctors who saw this case through say that, as far as they could tell, the man's brain started bleeding inside his skull after the 50-year-old headbanged with just a tad too much enthusiasm, EurekAlert informs.
For those unfamiliar with rock music and the proper ways to dance to it, it must be said that headbanging boils down to violently and rhythmically moving one's head to a song's tempo.
Since Motörhead's songs have especially fast tempos, it really should not come as such a surprise that, while shaking his head to them, this 50-year-old man ended up injuring his brain to such an extent that he needed medical attention.
As detailed in The Lancet, doctors at the Hannover Medical School in Germany had to perform surgery on the 50-year-old Motörhead fan in order to fix his brain. Thus, they had to open his skull and remove the blood clot that had formed on the right side of his brain.
What's more, they continued to drain the site of the injury for six days following the surgical intervention. By the looks of it, it took the 50-year-old, whose identity has not yet been shared with the public, about 2 months to recover from the incident.
Doctors believe that, all things considered, it is very much possible that other rock music fans develop brain injuries as well while headbanging to their favorite tunes. However, chances are that, more often than not, these injuries are not all that serious and, therefore, go unnoticed.
“Even though there are only a few documented cases of subdural haematomas, the incidence may be higher because the symptoms of this type of brain injury are often clinically silent or cause only mild headache that resolves spontaneously,” says Dr. Ariyan Pirayesh Islamian.
“This case serves as evidence in support of Motörhead's reputation as one of the most hardcore rock'n'roll acts on earth, if nothing else because of their music's contagious speed drive and the hazardous potential for headbanging fans to suffer brain injury,” the specialist adds.