The band began in spring of 2007 in response to a battle of the bands going on at some school. It was our drummer Anthony Pulcini and guitarist Matteo Conti who rallied some friends to play some Bodom and Mettalica covers. Our to-be vocalist Nathan Afilalo joined in several months after that on rhythm guitar. In its inception the band was called Set to Kill and suffered some minor line up changes. However, we truly solidified when our keyboardist Andrew Proppe, with his classical talents, joined up.  We continued until 2010 when our bassist and vocalist Oli  Aveline stepped down from vocal duties.  From then we saw that the band was forming itself anew and so having planned to record our demo in the summer, we changed names and vocalists to inaugurate the change that was taking place in our musical career. From there Dissension continued to play and write new material, as most of the material we had date from the very earliest inception of the band. In the winter of 2011 we played Canadian Music Week in Toronto, opening for Cryptopsy, which was a great honour. We continued from there on to play the Heavy MTL festival in Montreal. The same summer we had finished recording our album Of Time and Chronic Disease with Slaves On Dope’s Kevin Jardine at Uplift Studios.  From then on we built up anticipation for our album while lying somewhat low. I think we would like to say like a wolf ready to lunge however, it may be more like a man fallen over drunk with too much beer. What really awoke us from our stupor was when our bassists Oli left the band for good. Carlo quickly came in to fill the bassless void and from there we triumphantly marched into Canada’s 2013 Wacken Metal Battle. Making it into the final round, defeat finally found us, and yet the experience gave us a new sense of vitality. This leads us to today, mere weeks before our album release, where Dissension can finally, at the long awaited day, reveal Of Time and Chronic Disease to the world.

This has been an aggravating question since the beginning of the band as we could never provide a satisfactory answer. Listeners have described us as a combination of black, thrash, melo-death and power metal. As for us we aren’t pretentious to say that our music is completely original and sounds like nothing else in all the cosmos. As a band we enjoy reflecting the plurality of influences that we have hence the reason it’s a little difficult to find a monosyllabic title for our music.

How we describe ourselves is fashioning music that can be at once epic and at once quite dark. We like our songs to unfold as if they were stories or tales. So we try to harmonize various sounds to evoke certain thoughts and feelings. Its also important that each song can stand on it’s own. We are not going to add random elements into a song just for the sake of making sound more evil or what have you.

Its bands like Children of Bodom and Dimmu Borgir which really gave us the flavour for the use of a keyboard., as the potentials within are quite unlimited. Beyond that bands like Death, Dissection, Amon Amarth inspire some more melodic riffs while Celtic Frost and Megadeath are somewhat to blame for the overt thrash and ferocity.

Because we think they would be pleased with the various tones of our music. What’s great about metal is that its one of the realms of music where there is always expansion and growth. If you want a band to strictly adhere to a particular type of music then that’s not quite us. Rather we blend sounds in order to communicate something to the listener that perhaps they haven’t heard before.

Thus far we have released a 3 song EP in 2011 and the title track for our album Of Time and Chronic Disease.  In regards to the EP, it landed spots at the festivals we have played at and was a good stepping stone with which to go forward. However, the three songs we released there were surely not our strongest. With the song Of Time and Chronic Disease out people now have a better idea of what the rest of the album will sounds like, and the reaction to it has been fucking excellent.

We wouldn’t be much of a band if we didn’t play live we dare say! In fact, aside from the music itself, our live shows have been said to be our strongest asset. Live shows are the life’s blood of this band as we get to communicate to the crowd not only with the music but also with our actions and enthusiasm in the execution of the songs. 2011 was a massive year for us as we played Heavy MTL and opened for bands the likes of Cryptopsy. 2012 we took it easy prepping and practicing but keeping low. 2013 however we have come back with force, making it to the finals of the Wacken Metal Battle Canada and finally being able to release our album Of Time and Chronic Disease on September 13th!

Quite simply, because we attach our microphone to a battle axe on stage. Labels and  promoters should also be aware of our unique sound. This is what allows us to play with bands of almost any style of metal thus always making Dissension a sexy fit on the bill.

What's next to conquer on our path is, our album "Of Time and Chronic Disease" released September 10th worldwide along side with our album launch September 13th. We hope to create a lot of buzz in the underground scene and slowly start to spread our disease with time...

For those seeking to lose their virgin ears our music is up for listening on our youtube, Facebook, reverbnation and bandcamp pages. However best place to buy our stuff is at our shows. We want people to come and join in. 

September 2013