As both a song and album intended to invoke overwhelming solidarity, “Ten Thousand Fists” resembles the type of devil-horn’s salutation Ronnie James Dio wrote in the ’80s. But whereas Dio had the sense to steep his anthems in fantasy, Disturbed takes its exaggerated rebelliousness seriously. The Chicago hard-rock band, which has scored two platinum records by adhering to a formula that makes most of its output sound alike, doesn’t alter the script on this politically inspired effort. Staccato riffs, industrial-strength tempos and David Draiman’s pace-the-floor grunts and choral melodramatics smother everything from the title track to a comically bad cover of Genesis’ “Land of Confusion.” Busy angrily thumping its chests, Disturbed often stomps gothic melodies into the ground and ignores the irony of “Sons of Plunder,” which rips off the group’s early hit “Down With the Sickness.”
