Artistic manifestations generally have a communicative function towards a receiving audience. Normally, the content to be communicated is emotions, ideas, thoughts… that is, aspects of human behavior related to psychology.

But to make things worse, there are several films, theatrical performances or novels that not only convey this content, but their narrative is based purely on some psychological disorder or phenomenon. Examples of this would be the film "Better impossible" (obsessive-compulsive personality disorder) or the classic "Don Quixote de la Mancha", in which a delusional disorder symbolized idealism.

However, other artistic disciplines have also used this resource, perhaps in a more subtle and less popular way, such as painting, or music. Below we review several great musical works of the 20th century whose main narrative is centred on psychological aspects .

Rock ‘n’ Roll Classics on Psychology and Mental Disorders

These are several rock albums characterized by talking about different dimensions of mental disorders.

1. The Kinks – Soap Opera

The Kinks were already well versed in concept albums by the time they released Soap Opera, whose main theme would be everyday life, expressed through the experiment perpetrated by the main character in the story, the fictional rock star Starmaker, who, looking for inspiration for an album, changed his life with Norman, an a priori completely normal citizen.

The album tells the story of a day in the life of Norman, and how Starmaker has to adapt to this new situation. However, in its penultimate track we discover that both were the same person, having been a delirium of Norman caused by disenchantment with his routine and boring life, being Starmaker an alternative personality created by himself .

2. Lou Reed – Berlin

The obscure album of an up-and-coming Lou Reed focused on the relationship of Jim and Caroline, two junkies who were trying to develop a relationship. The drug use and violent relationship between the two led Caroline to sink into a deep depression and feel a strong learned helplessness , which would eventually lead her to suicide. In an argumentative premise as extreme as the one presented by Reed, it is easy to detect other mental health disorders such as borderline disorder, intermittent explosive disorder…

3. The Who – Tommy

The classic album of The Who, which has its film adaptation, tells the story of its namesake protagonist: Tommy, a boy who, after accidentally witnessing the murder of his mother’s lover at the hands of his father, who miraculously returned alive from the war, was left deaf, blind and mute, because his parents insisted that he had seen nothing, heard nothing, and would never say anything. A poetic and interesting reading of post-traumatic stress , as well as the power of suggestion, especially in children.

Speaking of The Who, it is inevitable in this regard to comment on his other famous Opera Rock, Quadrophenia, in which it is established that the protagonist has four personalities. However, this is a figure to represent the different behavioural tendencies of the protagonist in different contexts, and not a mental disorder per se.

4. Pink Floyd – The Wall

One of the most memorable works by Pink Floyd and Roger Waters, also called “the wall” in Spanish. It is the biography of a fictional rock star who loses his father in the war, suffers from his mother’s overprotection, the harassment of his teachers, disappointments in his love life… each of these stressful events is another brick in a metaphorical wall, which stands between him and the rest of the people, leading him to isolation, drug addiction and what we could call an example of schizotypal personality disorder .

5. Amy Winehouse – Back to Black

Although the album is not structured in such a way that all the tracks build a single story, the masterpiece of the late Amy Winehouse continuously resorts to the same themes in most of her tracks. As a visibly autobiographical contribution, Winehouse portrays the feelings of a convinced addict, with occasional bouts of anger and passive aggression (as in Rehab or Addicted) or the toxic relationships and calls for attention typical of borderline personality disorder (Back to Black, You Know That I’m not Good, Me and Mr. Jones).