Surging Debut: Alexisonfire

ALEXISONFIRE.

SCORE: 86/100

One of the most underspokenly important post-hardcore/emo bands debuted in 2002 with this self-titled album, with Alexisonfire becoming one of the most acclaimed, yet underground bands of the scene and times they were from. The album is raw and clearly youthful in a much more potent and raw way than most other bands could conceive, and the resulting album is one of precision and depth. 

This debut was recorded while a majority of the band's members were 17 years of age, with Dallas Green, one of the band's co-founders, being 22 years old at the time of recording. The album captures a scenic teenage angst that is chaotic, overdubbed, and clearly raw - and it feels like a basement band taken to a bigger scale while still keeping their clattered sound in tact. The sounds overlap and work over and through each other to create a chaotic heap of an album - but it manages to be so carefully laid out and placed together that it has a cohesiveness that few other young bands could've done as well as they did. 

Everything here comes together and adds depth to the album on a massive scale. Storming vocals, heavy instrumentals, raw power, and sheer lyrical prowess ensure that this album is a memorable journey into the band's artistry - and it manages to be the best possible debut that sets the scene of their entire style into stone. This album is one where raw/unclean vocals make up the basis for it, with cleaner, more melodic vocals being used sparingly and when the moments count the most. 

Something about Alexisonfire is how true they sound, they don't just sound like a mechanical band where everything is perfect and ordered by a label - they feel real, like something plausible, something almost local and familiar. Being a part of the alternative youth culture for some time and going to local shows and seeing all of the small artists performing is something truly special, and Alexisonfire don't sound like a mainstream turmoil at all - they have that local, homegrown feeling to them, where they sound like a band that would be playing small, gritty venues where the community youth come to express themselves.

It's rare that an album can capture such a vividly harsh and wild atmosphere while feeling so familiar, and this was a project that I unexpectedly connected with much more than I ever could have anticipated, especially after not previously enjoying their 2022 album, Otherness. 

The cover art for this album summarizes the style of the band very well - violent and gritty, raw and teenage; not unlike a schoolyard fight. The framing and theme of the artwork is striking, with the artwork being inspired by 'A Dagger Through the Heart of St. Angeles'. They manage to be controversial without crossing a line or being at all explicit, and it's clear that this is a band where they never needed to rely on falsified grappling tactics, gimmicks, or explicit content to make their music symbolize something and stand out from the crowd. 

Alexisonfire is not just another stereotypical emo album - it's something with much more fire. It feels like a deep pit of rage that was written and thrown together with emotions leading the fronts in every scenario, and despite the ruggedness of the album and the nature of the style used here, it feels much more polished while still being so deeply raw. It puts the hardcore into post-hardcore, and the scream into screamo.