Trivium – Ascendancy 20th Anniversary Celebration
Trivium – Ascendancy 20th Anniversary Celebration
By Oli Gonzalez
Some articles are painstakingly researched to ensure there’s sufficient detail to make it engaging. Some less.
Then there’s Trivium and their breakthrough album “Ascendancy”. The day I’m going to struggle to write or talk about this is the day that you can bury me in the cold hard ground! Released on March 15th 2005, 20 years ago to this day, the world of Metal was to be changed and disrupted in a serious way by a group of teenagers from Florida, USA. Considered an iconic and seminal album in the world of metal, its impact on the industry cannot be understated.
I still remember my introduction to this masterpiece and its impact on me vividly. Teenage Oli sat on his dad’s sofa and flicking through the music channels on a dull Sunday. The world of heavy and extreme music was one I had not yet discovered (which is bizarre considering that 33 year old me is now sat on his own sofa with Siberian Black Metal act Grima’s latest album being blasted down his headphones via Spotify as he writes this). No, I hadn’t been indoctrinated to the heavier side yet.
Like many 90s kids, the music channels were one of the main ways we discovered and consumed music. Either that, via the radio, or rummaging through your parents CD, cassette or vinyl collection. I had been brought up on a steady diet of classic and alternative ‘dad’ rock, and catching the tail end of Nu-Metal’s emergence meant that the likes of Linkin Park, Ill Nino and System Of A Down were heavily in my musical rotation. The early Metalcore movement was in full flow with Killswitch Engage leading the charge, yet this was as heavy as I would dare to go! There was something different about this afternoon though and my introduction to Trivium.
“PULL! HARDER! STRINGS! MARTYR!”
There was something unfathomably visceral and devastating about this iconic chorus as I saw the figure of frontman Matt Heafy screaming this from the TV screen with uncanny primitive angst! I had never seen nor heard anything like this! Yet it wasn’t just the pure aggression in his voice nor the overall blunt force intensity of the music. There was a melodic undertone to ‘Pull Harder On The Strings Of Your Martyr’ that was as addictive as it was thoroughly intoxicating, especially given the iconic opening guitar lead riff to this track.
Of course, 13 year old Oli did not possess the relevant vocabulary to describe this to anybody else in this level of detail. All I could do was stare at the screen with my jaw on the floor, knowing that I was hooked and needed to have another taste of this. Though this was before the days of pulling out a smartphone and clicking on Spotify, YouTube, or another streaming service, meaning I had two choices. Either wait hours or potentially days for the video to come back on TV with no guarantee of this happening, or grab my coat and pocket money, and tell my dad that I was making the short 20 minute walk into the town centre to make a pilgrimage to HMV and get my hands on my own copy of the CD! Normally, I’d take my time to browse through the CDs to see what could take my fancy. Not that day. No, I made a beeline for the Metal section and within a few minutes, I was now a proud owner of Trivium’s “Ascendancy”. And that’s where it really began…
Now no longer subject to TV’s restricted schedule, I now had unlimited access to the most recent acquisition to my CD collection. Back on the sofa with my CD player and headphones, it was time for a deep dive. The spinechilling and haunting instrumental number that is ‘End Of Everything’, the sheer juggernaut and riff fests that are ‘Rain’ and ‘A Gunshot To The Head Of Trepidation’, the short melodic blast of ‘Dying In Your Arms’, the slower bludgeoning attack of ‘Suffocating Sight’, or the densely layered emotional underrated epic that is ‘Departure’. This was overwhelming for me, but in the greatest sense. I didn’t know I needed this in my life, but now I was starting to feel complete. Unfortunately, I would have to leave my CD player and go to school the next day. Maths felt especially painful that day, Science more mind-numbing than usual. I couldn’t wait for the school bell to ring at 3.25pm so that I could sprint out of the gates, jump on the bus home and pick up where I had left the next day.
The term gateway album is often used in the music industry, an album which serves as a stepping stone into deeper discovery for that band’s album. This discovery had well and truly commenced, and Pandora’s box opened. Trivium only had one other album out at this time, their debut “Ember To Inferno”. You’d better believe that I had made another trip to HMV to acquire this! Though discovering Trivium had led me to make another purchase and subsequent addition to my CD collection. Through some Google searches on my school’s PC during ICT lessons (naughty naughty), I had learned about a project by Roadrunner Records Essentially, the label had arranged 57 musicians from 45 roster bands past or present (at the time) to create an 18 track compilation album to celebrate the labels 25th anniversary. Matt Heafy had been chosen as 1 of 4 team captains, tasked with assembling a group of musicians and composing 4 songs as well as performing on another. This compilation album named “The Allstar Sessions” led me down a rabbit hole of discovering artists that I still love and admire to this day, including but certainly not limited to Chimaira, Deicide, and Opeth. Would I have discovered this album and these bands if it wasn’t for that chance Sunday in front of the TV 20 years ago? Who knows. What I do know is that all these thoughts and feelings flooded my brain in January of this year, as I was sat in the Coop Arena, Manchester as I witnessed this full album playthrough on the acclaimed Poisoned-Ascendancy tour. It felt warm, nostalgic, comforting even to reminisce in this moment, as it does right now as I type this.
What’s your experience of this album?
Disclaimer: This article is solely the property of Oli Gonzalez and Ever Metal. It is strictly forbidden to copy any part of this article, unless you have the strict permission of both parties. Failure to adhere to this will be treated as plagiarism and will be reported to the relevant authorities.
