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Music: The Agonist

From left to right: Danny, Alissa, Simon, Chris, Paco

Does history guide you, or do you set out to change it?

—Business Suits and Combat Boots

The Agonist (formerly known as The Tempest) is a Canadian Melodic Death Metal/metalcore band from Montreal, characterised by topical lyrics, complex guitar work and a female lead who can sing (well) in both clean and growling vocals.

Their lyrics often consider themes that you might not expect from a death metal band, such as animal rights, social injustice and other contemporary issues.

Their current line-up is:

Alissa White-Gluz - Vocals, Lyrics
Danny Marino - Guitar
Chris Kells - Bass, Background Growls
Simon McKay - Drums
Pascal "Paco" Jobin - Guitar

Former members include:

Andrew Tapley - Guitar
Chris Adolph - Guitar on tour (2009)
Justin Deguire - Guitar on tour (2011)

So far they have released two studio albums:

Once Only Imagined (2007)
Lullabies For The Dormant Mind (2009)

And they have music videos for:

The Agonist provide examples of:

A Good Name for a Rock Band - "Agonist" means initiator/starter of something (fitting in with the band's topical song lyrics).
Air Guitar - How Danny comes up with his riffs.
All Men Are Perverts - Simon, apparently. He tried hitting on Alissa at his audition. Maybe it's because all drummers are animals?
Altum Videtur - Memento Mori and Globus Hystericus.
Apathetic Citizens - Alissa's Berserk Button.
Audience Participation Song - Thank You Pain is an audience participation video casting Alissa as a defendent, death-growl Alissa as a judge, and the audience as the jury.
Beyond the Impossible - An ongoing competition between Alissa's whiplash vocals, Danny's Epic Riffs and Simon's ludicrously fast drumming.
Black Sheep Hit - Waiting Out The Winter was composed by Simon.
The Cameo - Quite a few, including Youri from Unhuman and Frank Marino from Mahogany Rush. Even their producer got in a few sneaky Metal Screams.
- And in turn Alissa has cameo'd in songs for Synastry and Plasmarifle. You can see her wearing a Plasmarifle t-shirt at the end of the Business Suits music video.
Concept Video - Thank You Pain (verging on surreal).
Costume Porn
Distracted By The Shiny - Stopping in the middle of an interview to point out a typo on a passing van.
Dramatic...Ellipsis - ...And Their Eulogies Sang Me To Sleep
Dress Rehearsal Video - Eulogies, Birds Elope
Epic Riff
Ethereal Choir - Swan Lake
- Also in the background of a few other songs.
Fore Shadowing - Synopsis, the slightly mind screwy intro from their first album, contains a distorted vocal excerpt of Rise and Fall.
Genre Busting - The band has variously been described as Melodic Death Metal, Metalcore (due to their use of breakdowns and alternating clean/harsh vocals) and Deathcore, and they also have some progressive elements.
Gratuitous French - At the end of Martyr Art.
Green Aesop
Humans Are Flawed - A theme in many of their songs (Thank You Pain, among others).
- Alternatively, Humans Are Bastards - Rise and Fall, The Sentient.
Indecipherable Lyrics - On occasion.
LOLCats - Alissa is a fan.
Look on My Works, Ye Mighty, and Despair - Discussed in Globus Hystericus.
Master Race - The concept is venomously attacked in Born Dead, Buried Alive.
Metal Scream
Mohs Scale of Rock and Metal Hardness - 8/9.
Morality Ballad - Lots of them.
My Car Hates Me - Their touring van, "the blue hornet", has a habit of breaking down in the worst possible places.
- Tonight Someone Dies - They are going to get their revenge by destroying it on film, and are taking suggestions from fans as to how they should do it.
Simon: "Baseball bats, spiked clubs, grenades, TNT...do you think we could procure a flamethrower?"
Non Appearing Title
Pimped Out Dress - Alissa, in Thank You, Pain.
Precision F-Strike
The Power of Friendship - Alissa apparently had some creative difficulties writing for their third album, so Simon stepped in to help out. The results, judging by the EP, are awesome.
Protest Song - Again, lots of them.
Sixth Ranger - Pascal Jobin, who joined the band in 2010 (and, formerly, Chris Adolph their official touring guitarist).
Soprano and Gravel - In this case, both provided by the same singer.
Subdued Section - Both within the context of the album (Chiaroscuro, Swan Lake) and within individual songs (such as Void of Sympathy and Chlorpromazine).
Talking to Himself - Thank You Pain
This Is Sparta - In Trophy Kill ("Fuck! You! Fucking hypocrite!")
Throw It In - The "false start" at the beginning of Eulogies is an out-take that they decided to keep.
Titled After The Song - Inverted with The Tempest, which was the original band name.
Truck Driver's Gear Change - Chlorpromazine, where Alissa's growl rises to a shriek after the bridge.
Walking Disaster Area - An alarming number of their gigs have coincided with various natural disasters.
Alissa: "I feel like as a band we are sync'd with nature in the worst way possible."
You Gotta Have Blue Hair - Alissa, though she regularly cycles through red, purple and blonde as well.
Your Princess Is in Another Castle - Born Dead Buried Alive sounds like it's about to end on a long, fading guitar chord, then cuts back in and plays for another 30 seconds.

Turn of the Millennium

Angelspit

alternative title(s): The Agonist

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