Cohésion, a five-piece metallic hardcore band from Paris, is releasing its second EP, “plagued by a cancer called greed,” on January 24. This new 4-tracker addresses unity in shared struggles, anti-imperialism, resistance, and class war, while questioning individual inaction in precarious times.
It builds on the band’s origins during the pandemic, when they set out to make “politically driven hardcore” focusing on social and environmental issues. As one member admits, “When composing our first EP, we probably focused more on the message than the music even, which is why looking back I admit some of us feel it might have been a bit premature musically.”
Since that initial release in 2022–2023, the group has played around a dozen shows in France and Belgium.
They also filled out the lineup and expanded their influences, reflecting a shared passion for the 2000s metalcore revival and for older inspirations. “On these new tracks, we’ve tried to combine all of this with the more modern influences we might have had before,” they explain, citing bands like Balmora, Cauldron, Seed of Pain, Undying, Contention, Mourning, and Arkangel. Interested listeners can find a playlist they curated on Spotify with the key references that shaped this EP.
The band recorded this EP throughout 2023–2024 with a patchwork process that involved several studios and contributors. Most guitars, bass, and synths were produced by Timothée Froger (of Sorcerer) in his home studio. He mixed the EP and added piano and samples on “Chains of Inaction.” Drums were tracked with Johan B. at Mannaz Records, and vocals were recorded in the studios where one band member works. Anthony Burke from Magnitude / Moment of Truth handled mastering.
Looking ahead to 2025, Cohésion plans a small release show soon, then intends to write new music and schedule more performances—particularly in other European countries. “We would definitely love to play some fests,” they say. For now, “plagued by a cancer called greed” is out on January 24, and the final mas.
The sample in the « Introduction » is from the show The Americans. It’s a scene where a war veteran is on the roof of a building with a sniper rifle and he’s waiting to fire on some World Bank leader.
As soon as I watched it I thought about sampling it. I never thought it would be this relevant to the news, with all the Luigi Mangione shenanigans and stuff. It’s also tied to the title of the EP « plagued by a cancer called greed », because to us, it’s becoming more and more apparent that one of the great, if not the greatest, threats to all humans and non-human species are the extreme minority of wealth-hoarders.
This is sadly very much present in the news lately just by looking at all the big-tech maniacs embracing fascism (or neo-fascism) all over the world to preserve their interests and power (as they always have throughout history…). When we say that we need cohesion, we mean unity and togetherness, to fight back as a united majority of people who are either exploited for profit, oppressed by capitalistic imperialism, or endangered by climate inaction.
The lyrics to « Dominion » are sparse, but we feel they might also be the most important on the EP. They’re also more figurative than we are used to, but they definitely have a very concrete tie to reality. It was indeed mainly inspired by the past 15 months, where we have been reminded of and witnessed the full extent of how religion and beliefs can be used as excuses to disguise abhorrent imperialistic, racist and colonialist ideologies. Free Palestine is all there is to say!
« Chains of Inaction » is the track where we feel we went all out, trying a lot of new things musically. The piano and strings intro was the first part written I think, originally just a clean guitar before Tim (Froger) worked his magic with the piano and samples.
This is also our first feature, with our good friend Chouippos from Bordeaux metalcore band Kibosh, with whom we did a sick weekender last autumn.
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We really wanted to try a featuring on this release but we weren’t quite sure over which part, and maybe we felt a bit awkward asking people. And coincidentally Chouippos asked us first, cause he liked the part and wanted to add his touch to it. We’re really glad he did because we think it took the track to a whole other level.
The fun fact I love about writing « Clouded Eyes » is that it started with just a couple of drum beats. Hugo sent the first two drum parts to me with nothing else, and then we had to come up with the rest around it and the main riff. It was an unusual way of composing for us but I love how it turned out. Then for the ending, we really wanted to write a sort of long, more melodic outro, with lyrics that are repeated over and over and easily remembered.
I think Josselin started singing the clean vocals that you hear in the background during rehearsal one time when he was trying not to scream or damage his voice, but we instantly loved the way he did it, and we ended up mixing it with the spoken-word version that was previously done. And then he also proposed the screamed backing vocals that superpose at the very end. He went into the booth, into the corner as far from the mic as possible, and just started laying it all out, giving everything he had. It was such a cool improvised moment and we love the result.
