I’ve been very keen on The Agonist for a while now and having listened through a number of their releases, I just get a feeling like they keep getting better and better with every piece of music they put out. 2019’s “Orphans” was without a doubt their strongest release til’ that point and it proved them to be not only very capable musicians, but seriously soulful maniacs, as the album’s concept and emotional delivery was dark, somber and dramatic. Now, the Canadian quintet returns with “Days Before The World Wept”, and despite being just a 5-song EP, I think it might just be their strongest release to date!
Throughout the years, I would say The Agonist always bordered on the extreme sides of metal but also seemed to have some elements that made them more accessible. However, this is the first time I’m willing to describe their sound as fully fledged progressive technical death metal. The outpour of extremity, technical proficiency and unexpected rhythmic shifts that they bring forth on this release is unlike anything they’ve ever done. Not to be confused for a nerd-prog band, despite the added complexity, I think their songwriting has reached a level of maturity that enables them to pull off some absurd twists and acrobatics while maintaining a superbly coherent flow and energy to the music.
Looking at Simon Mckay’s drum delivery, I find it difficult to believe this guy has only 4 limbs. The opener ‘Remnants in Time’ displays a ridiculous storm of blast beats, machine-gun-like transitions and alternating hyper-speed grooves that puts him in the spotlight more than any other song on the EP. However, he does not draw attention away from the rest of the band, rather drives them all forward. The riffs are incredibly fluid, keeping up the pace and dynamic with the drum parts and forming a massive wall of melodic yet abrasive sound, going in unison with the grinding drums. I love how they were able to fuse hooky, memorable themes in the tapestry of riff-madness, not even necessarily bringing out any melody, but just keeping wildly inspired harmonies and chord progressions in the groundwork of riffage, such that even the most brutal moments just sound so musical and balanced. Alongside this, the bass pummeling is equally savage, but on this particular release, Chris Kells has gone full tech-death mode, bringing forth the side of fluid bass sound you expect to hear in Beyond Creation or First Fragment yet he still constantly returns to the classic background pounding you hear in more traditional metal soundscapes.
Looking at guitar solos, The Agonist always had Pascal “Paco” Jobin take over the shred-fests while Danny Marino was in charge of the more melodic leads and rhythm section. Which gets me to believe, if they keep the same dynamic going, that he’s hardly putting in any work on lead sections because the amount of mad shredding going on in the solos is off the charts. Surprisingly though, not every song has a solo, only ‘Remnants in Time’ and ‘Feast on The Living’ do, but in the other tracks, we still get these evil tapping or shredding melodies soaring over the riffs from time to time, just to spice things up some more.
Compared to a full technical death metal band though, these guys do pace themselves more. On songs like ‘Immaculate Deception’ and ‘Resurrection’ we get some seriously nasty, groovy headbang patterns and on the former, even a proper breakdown, unleashing the filth in undead glory… And speaking of the undead, this brings me to the absolute vocal powerhouse that is Vicky Psarakis, who shows off some insane gutturals in the afore-mentioned breakdown and on several other occasions, but for most of the time, she rests in mid-range and high-pitched screams. Why is she undead you say? Well, my gut tells me she’s in charge of the lyrics, and this particular release seems to have a thing for people coming back from the dead. I wouldn’t be sure but I think we might be looking at a zombie apocalypse style concept, or maybe something even more creative and sinister. Thus, her vocals don’t just sound aggressive and powerful, but in the context of the lyrics and music, downright apocalyptic. The constant shifting between different scream tones is ridiculous and the clean vocal performance has such incredible range, volume and evil charisma that it just creeps under your skin to give you the sweetest, gnarliest serotonin-infused heebee jeebees. It’s kinda like watching an action horror movie with a bag of salted caramel popcorn for emotional comfort, but in the end you’re still on edge. To top it off, the layers of orchestration and backing operatic vocals complete the spectrum of ominous emotions.
Other than the “Oh Holy Breakdown”, moments that require special attention are the use of creepy piano in the start and end of ‘Remnants in Time’, use of clean guitar kicking off ‘Days Before the World Wept’ and the ‘In Vertigo’ reprise in the intro to ‘Feast on the Living’, which has me wondering whether it’s the Orphans from 2019 that eventually perished and came back for revenge. Either way, I ain’t no one’s meal, which is why this is probably a good point to wrap up this review. The Agonist have delivered a sweet dose of explosive musical terror that will make you happy to be scared, now I’ll go get my popcorn.
Originally written for The Progspace.
Well, they’re back with a bang. Ok… actually… they were back a month ago but I’ve been busy. The Agonist redefined themselves with “Orphans” back in 2019, and 2 years later they’re already dropping a new EP in the dramatic and dramatically titled “Days Before the World Wept”. And while the last album was quite groundbreaking, the band still found room to explore new territory with this release. The Agonist’s patented extreme metal puts together melodic death metal with prog and technical flavors, and this time around it’s particularly focused on the techy and dark side compared to the previous release but stays equally infectious and catchy.
The advantage of short compact releases is that you can make them so diverse and free of repetition or redundancy. While “Orphans” has little to no filler material, “Days Before the World Wept” is an absolute zero on that measurement. These 5 tracks are all hyper engaging and all different from one another. The sound mixing feels a bit more raw and old-school compared to “Orphans” but still very much intelligible. We can hear the dual-guitar dynamic in all its glory and the bass is very present as well, bringing a lot of dynamic lines more akin to technical death metal acts. We’ve got less solo action but very dynamic riffs which I felt at times have a little bit of a Periphery feeling. The guitars weave beautiful harmonies in some places, heavy grooves in others and the mad man behind the kit glues it all together with effortless controlled chaos. I mean… it sounds effortless, but the fact of the matter is only for Simon to know. And the network of rhythmic intricacies, some obvious and surprising, others more subtle, changing details underneath the forefront, makes the music run like a wild beast that just cannot be caught off guard. The merger of said musical components creates a well-balanced blend of surprising twists as well as hooky ideas, keeping both the brain and the feels engaged through the full ep. So as far as the instrumental part goes, we’ve got the good’ol Agonist with some refreshing new fragrances in the mix.
Then we’ve got the vocals, and one cannot help but notice how Vicky can recognize her strong points and develop them. “Orphans” really had some great shock value moments with Vicky’s lowest growls, stepping slightly into Deathcore territory, and she also brought a slight symphonic edge with atmospheric layers of vocals surrounding the lead. She’s doing more of both on “Days Before the World Wept” which not only works perfectly in sync with the evil tone of the music but also creates some of the most complex and rich vocal dynamics in The Agonist’s history, with layers on top of layers on top of you guessed it… more LAYERS! Boy is she gonna regret this when she’ll have to do these songs live. But since we’re talking about “evil”, the entire soundscape along with Vicky at her most “Grr” seems to guide the EP towards a bit of a concept. Now I might be wrong with this take but putting together lyrics from “Remnants in Time”, “Resurrection” and “Feast on The Living” the story seems to develop around someone whose life is being stolen from them, but they refuse to die and well… maybe or maybe not Zombie Apocalypse happens. But have a look at the words yourself and make up your own mind. Regardless of what it means, this is indeed a soundtrack to wake the undead from the graves and make the world weep… or headbang… or both.
I could go into the specifics of each song, but that could be a whole other write up so I’ll conclude here. If high energy, engaging, catchy death metal is your thing, look no further. If epic metal with a sense of narrative and evil theatrical vocals is your thing, look no further. If you have ears… look no further. The Agonist just bring it with “Days Before the World Wept”, and while it may fall a little short from the magnum opus that was “Orphans”, it’s more than enough to keep a metalhead satisfied (and maybe a little terrified) for a consistent time to come. Out now on Napalm Records and Bandcamp!
Enjoy!
Originally written for The Metal Observer