Line #25 Music/ZealAndArdor


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/83bd1a97_a304_4ace_a02b_e6c011b1ca1b.jpeg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:L-R: Marco von Allmen, Tiziano Volante, Denis Wagner, Manuel Gagneux, Marc Obrist, Mia Rafaela Dieu]]
3
4	->''No grace, say the beast’s own name''
5	->''Left hand up by the end of the day''
6	->''Many gonna die and the sun don’t shine''
7	->''When the servants have their way''
8
9	-->--“Servants”
10
11	Zeal and Ardor is an [[AvantGardeMetal avant-garde]] musical group created in 2013 by Swiss-American musician Manuel Gagneux. It combines elements of {{blues}}, {{gospel\|Music}}, traditional African-American spirituals, and BlackMetal. The idea for this unusual combination originated on 4chan’s music board, when Gagneux was challenged to create a song combining black metal and traditional black American music (though because this was [[WretchedHive 4chan]], the poster didn’t say “black American”). Gagneux, the son of an African-American mother and a Swiss father, has also stated that a significant idea behind the project was asking [[AlternateHistory what would have happened]] if African-American slaves had embraced Satanism rather than Christianity (based on the observation that both they and Scandinavia were forcibly converted to Christianity in real-world history).
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13	After a self-titled demo in 2014, they released their first album, ''Devil Is Fine'', in 2016, to significant critical acclaim. Their second full-length, ''Stranger Fruit'', followed in 2018.
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15	You can stream and purchase their discography on [[https://zealandardor.bandcamp.com Bandcamp]].
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17	!! Discography
18	* 2014 - ''Zeal and Ardor'' (demo)
19	* 2016 - ''Devil Is Fine''
20	* 2018 - ''Stranger Fruit''
21	* 2018 - ''Live in Montreux'' (limited edition, vinyl-only release [[NoExportForYou only sold on the band's 2018-2019 European tour]])
22	* 2019 - ''Live in London''
23	* 2020 - ''Wake of a Nation'' (EP)
24	* 2022 - ''Zeal & Ardor''
25	* 2024 - ''GREIF''
26
27	!! Tropes:
28	* AlbumTitleDrop: PlayedWith. In addition to the TitleTrack (obviously), the phase “Strange Fruit” also appears in “Built on Ashes”. The album title is ''Strange'''r''' Fruit''. This also doubles as a ShoutOut to the Music/BillieHoliday song that inspired the album title.
29	* AlternateHistory: Essentially a musical example, as explained in the band description.
30	* AvantGardeMetal: Are they ever!
31	* BadassBoast: From "Ship on Fire"
32	--> ''I come in the breath of the dead''
33	--> ''Bathing in my papa's blood''
34	--> ''Bare-boned and covered in red''
35	* BilingualBonus: “We Can’t Be Found” contains some phrases in German. Gagneux, it should be noted, is a native of Switzerland, where German is one of the official languages.
36	* BlackMetal: Mixed in with {{Blues}} amongst others.
37	** GenreMashup: Being primarily a mix of Slave Spirituals/Field Hollers, blues, and satanic black metal. The project has also incorporated elements from GospelMusic, {{djent}}, {{Industrial}}, MelodicDeathMetal, Creator/{{Motown}}, ElectronicMusic, DrumAndBass, and even NuMetal (Gagneux has described bands like Music/{{Deftones}} and Music/LimpBizkit as “guilty pleasures”). The band has also cited Music/TomWaits and Music/WendyCarlos as influences, and the demo also contains some influence from HipHop and {{reggae}}, though the latter is fairly subtle. (As for writers, Gagneux cites Creator/PhilipKDick and Creator/OctaviaButler as particular literary influences.) In some cases this also crosses over into GenreRoulette territory; this is more pronounced on the demo and the first record, however.
38	** GenreRoulette: The self-titled in particular engages in quite a bit of this, touching on several genres that aren't really dabbled in again on later releases.
39	* BoleroEffect: Around half of the songs that contain both blues and black metal will use this as a way to transition between the two styles without feeling disjointed.
40	* CarefulWithThatAxe: Comes with the territory of being a black metal act, but given the band’s SopranoAndGravel vocal styles, this trope seems a bit more pronounced here than is typical for the genre.
41	* DarkerAndEdgier: Listeners familiar with Gagneux’s BaroquePop project Birdmask, but not with the concept of this band, are in for a shock.
42	* DeconstructorFleet: American history, GospelMusic, BlackMetal, Satanism, Christianity, and numerous other elements of society are thrown together in a blender in a way that completely scrambles the expected reading of any of them, resulting in all kinds of {{inver\|tedTrope}}sions, {{subver\|tedTrope}}sions, {{deconstruct}}ions, and {{zig\|ZaggingTrope}}-zaggings.
43	* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The obvious reading of the band’s songs is as narratives of a slave revolt, of course, but many are also intentionally written so that they can also be read as messages to the American middle class, casting the modern-day treatment of African-Americans (especially by police) in light of slavery. Gagneux has said:
44	--> “Lyrically the intent was for [‘Servants’] to be read in two different ways. It could be read as a slave revolution and a call to revolt, but it could also be read as a message to the American middle class. I don’t really want to say much more than that… in fact that level of ambiguity is something that continues throughout this record.”
45	* DownerEnding: “Built on Ashes” is one lyrically, though [[LyricalDissonance it sounds more like]] a BittersweetEnding musically.
46	--> ''Like a strange fruit that's out of season\
47	You are bound to die alone\
48	You will swing free on the breeze then\
49	You are bound to die alone [...]\
50	Don't darling die on me now\
51	We'll dig a grave close to your home\
52	Don't you fix your eyes on me now\
53	We never said you'd come back home''
54	* GodIsLoveSongs: Several songs essentially serve as inversions of this trope's first half.
55	* HollywoodSatanism: Averted, with the satanic elements meaning to invert but also reflect the rebellion and freedom at the core of American Slave Spirituals. Because of this, their music somehow manages to bring the core element of liberation that runs through both Satanism and Christianity to the forefront, revealing how in practice they are similar, and it feels genuinely religious in a way that is very uncommon in modern music.
56	* IAmTheBand: Manuel Gagneux handled all the instruments and production on the debut album ''Devil Is Fine'' and handled most of them (except for drums done by Marco von Allmen) on ''Stranger Fruit''.
57	* {{Instrumental}}: About a third of their songs. Many also qualify as {{Breather Episode}}s.
58	* LiveAlbum: ''Live in Montreux'' and ''Live in London'' are both cases of ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin.
59	* LyricalColdOpen: Some songs such as “Blood in the River” open with Gagneux’s voice unaccompanied.
60	* LyricalDissonance: Done intentionally on several songs. “You Ain’t Coming Back” and “Built on Ashes” are two examples, both mixing pleasant melodies and arrangements with dark lyrical content.
61	* MetalScream: Wouldn’t be BlackMetal without some, being especially present in ''Stranger Fruit''. Type 3 is most common, though Type 2 shows up briefly in “Don’t You Dare.”
62	* MinisculeRocking: Many of their songs are fewer than two minutes long, though many of these are also more interludes than songs. By BlackMetal standards, they also qualify as a meta example, since black metal songs tend to be on the longer side.
63	* MoodWhiplash: Songs can transition from blues and gospel style to BlackMetal and back on a dime.
64	* OminousMusicBoxTune: “Children’s Summon” features a music-box-like synthesizer riff.
65	* OminousLatinChanting: “Coagula” features the words “''solve''” and “''coagula''” repeated constantly throughout the entire song. ''Solve'' (present active imperative singular of ''[[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/solvo#Latin solvō]]'') and ''coāgula'' (indicative/accusative/vocative plural of ''[[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/coagulum#Latin coāgulum]]''), like most Latin words, have several different meanings, but the phrase "Solve coāgula" (particularly in the context of the album) can be translated roughly as "Untie the bonds" or (more metaphorically) "Break the shackles". It is a slight modification of a motto from alchemy, "solve '''et''' coāgulā" (note the added macron over the second ''ā''), which means "dissolve and coagulate"; ''coāgulā'' is the present active imperative singular of ''[[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/coagulo#Latin coāgulō]]''. However, in the context of the album, the former interpretation seems most appropriate.
66	* ProtestSong: A lot of their discography qualifies, with a fairly strong {{Aesop}} against racism in particular.
67	* RockMeAsmodeus: Even by BlackMetal standards, this is unusually central to the concept of the band.
68	* SatanIsGood: Played straight, though in a GoodIsNotNice fashion. “Devil Is Fine” is probably as good an example as any.
69	* SelfBackingVocalist: Gagneux frequently overdubs several vocal tracks to create a choir consisting entirely of his own voice, resulting in a sound that is virtually unique in metal music. This can also be combined with SopranoAndGravel as described below, still in SelfBackingVocalist territory.
70	* SelfTitledAlbum: The demo and the 2022 release.
71	* SongStyleShift: Honestly, at least a quarter of their songs do this ''at least'' once.
72	* SopranoAndGravel: Alternates soulful clean singing with some ''intense'' {{Metal Scream}}s; sometimes (mostly on the demo and ''Devil Is Fine'') these occur at the same time, thanks to overdubbing. Notably, the vocals are so well executed that some critics initially assumed that Gagneux had sampled them from obscure old soul or blues recordings, which Gagneux sharply denies. Given that he pulls them off live, he's almost certainly telling the truth about this.
73	* TitledAfterTheSong: ''Stranger Fruit'', of course, is a reference to Music/BillieHoliday’s SignatureSong, “Strange Fruit”.

Context Music / ZealAndArdor