Wow, In This Moment didn’t mess around getting their second album out on Century Media. Their form of female fronted KSE styled metalcore core meets Evanescence must have moved a few units for this quick of a turn around. Except this bio here sheet says ….they are now from Canada and erm…..the singer, who is now Vegan, seems to have improved her clean singing and looks has dyed her hair from blond to ……ah….blue/black and …hmmmmmm …the band seems to have changed their name to The Agonist.

Fuck. My bad.

Seriously though, that pretty much sums up this debut from Montreal’s The Agonist is pretty much a carbon copy of In This Moment’s Beautiful Tragedy, except vocalist Alissa White-Gluz has a far more impressive clean croon for the many choruses, often being more in line with her more operatic based European Goth peers. Her growl also isn’t quite as shrieky as In This Moment’s Maria Brinks, sounding more like Angela Gossow.

Musically though, the bands are virtually identical with lots of fairly well done thrashy, melodic, semi Swedish licks, riffs and breakdowns based around Gluz’s tasteful choruses (“Trophy Kill” and first single “Business Suits and Combat Boots”) pretty mush encapsulates the band’s sound), that seem to be slightly better crafted than In This Moment’s, though their metal aspect isn’t quite as polished or rounded as In This Moment’s.

There’s not much in the way of surprises or originality here; there’s the obligatory interlude (“Chiaroscuro”), more ballad-y moment (“Serendipity”) a dn forced brutality (“Forget Tomorrow”) but the album reeks of Century Media striking while the female fronted extreme metal iron is hot (paving the way for the new Arch Enemy no doubt), but is it moderately enjoyable (I rather liked “Void of Sympathy”) and each track could be a hit single in the genre. Plus it’s better than Century Media’s recent At All Cost and Arsonists Get All The Girls releases and bound to better than the unfathomable impending release by new signee’s, Blessed By A Broken Heart.

[Visit the band's website]

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