Djabu

Disturbed's third studio album, Ten Thousand Fists, was released on September 20, 2005. The album debuted at number-one on the Billboard 200, while also selling around 238,000 copies in the week following its release. The album was certified platinum, shipping 1,000,000 units, in the United States on January 5, 2006. The band toured with 10 Years and Ill Niño in support of the album. Disturbed headlined Ozzfest 2006 along with Ozzy Osbourne, System of a Down, Lacuna Coil, DragonForce, Avenged Sevenfold, and Hatebreed.

In an interview with Launch Radio Networks, Disturbed vocalist David Draiman stated that twenty songs were recorded for the album, but only fourteen made it to the final track listing. The remaining songs included "Hell", which was included in one of the two "Stricken" singles; "Monster", which was included as an iTunes pre-order bonus for Ten Thousand Fists, then later included on the Ten Thousand Fists Tour Edition; "Two Worlds", which was also included on the Tour Edition of Ten Thousand Fists; and "Sickened", which was included in the "Land of Confusion" single.

Ten Thousand Fists is the first album released by Disturbed to feature guitar solos. The band stated that they felt that guitar solos are a part of music that is absent in a lot of modern music, and they wanted to bring some of that back. Songs like "Stricken", "Overburdened", and "Land of Confusion" all feature guitar solos, as well as many others.

In 2006, a European tour was scheduled but had been moved twice due to Draiman having troubles with severe acid reflux, which affected his voice. Draiman commented, "I had been taking Prevacid for about four years and my body built up a resistance to it, to the point where it wasn't doing anything anymore...I had a night of drinking in London followed by a full day and night of drinking on a day off in Dublin, because what else is there to do in Ireland but drink? That, coupled with a show where I had monitor problems, and I pretty much trashed my voice." Later that year, Draiman underwent surgery for a deviated septum which affected his voice. It was successful, and ever since then, Draiman has limited his drinking on the road.

Draiman became involved in the peer-to-peer file sharing controversy by publicly speaking out against the RIAA's lawsuits against file sharing individuals, despite the fact his record label is a member of the RIAA. Draiman commented, "This is not rocket science. Instead of spending all this money litigating against kids who are the people they're trying to sell things to in the first place, they have to learn how to effectively use the Internet. For the artists, my ass...I didn't ask them to protect me, and I don't want their protection." Draiman also told NYRock: "[I'm] Very positive about the internet, Napster. I think it's a tremendous tool for reaching many more people than we ever could without it. When you release music you want it to be heard by people...Nothing is going to do that better than Napster. I can't tell you how many kids have come up to me and said, 'I downloaded a couple of tunes off Napster and I went out and bought the album.'...I don't really make money off of record sales anyway."

In late 2006, Disturbed headlined another one of their own tours named Music as a Weapon III; the bands Flyleaf, Stone Sour, and Nonpoint toured with them. Disturbed completed the first leg of their Music as a Weapon III tour in late 2006. Soon after, Draiman stated that there was not going to be a second leg to the tour and that instead the band was going off the road to start working on their fourth studio album.