Alexisonfire
Alexisonfire is a hardcore punk band from St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. Their music is characterized by turbulent and explosive dynamics with intricate guitar melodies. Consisting of five friends, they formed in late 2001 as the result of a three-band break up. The band's name is a sort-of homage to a contortionist stripper named Alexis Fire, who claimed to be the only lactating stripper. 1 The band came into a bit of trouble when she discovered they were using her website name (alexisonfire.com) as their band name and threatened to sue them, but since she had never copyrighted the name, it was OK for them to use it. Alexisonfire's lyrical topics range from relationship troubles to go-karting, all delivered either by George's tormented screams, Dallas' sweet vocal melodies or Wade's sarcastic sneer.
Recently the band have traveled the majority of Europe and Australia with the band Rise Against with whom they are now very well acquainted. The band is also reaching out to the world outside of their home country of Canada with numerous European shows selling out or venue sizes being upgraded to accommodate the huge number of fans.
Despite popular belief from some individuals, not helped by the band spelling their name as one word, the band is called "Alexis On Fire" not "Alex Is On Fire".
If you have an Alexisonfire tattoo the band permit you to see any of their live shows, anywhere, for free.
The video for Pulmonary Archery won 'Best Video' at the 2004 Canadian Independent Music Awards.
Pulmonary Archery also was the first #1 in the charts to be achieved by a "hardcore" band.
They won a VideoFACT award at the 2004 MuchMusic Video Awards
They won for New Group Of The Year at the 2005 Juno awards.
The video for Accidents won Best Independent Video at the 2005 MuchMusic Video Awards
The band were also nominated for a Peoples' Choice Award as Favourite Canadian Group but lost out to Simple Plan.
Alexisonfire's successes haven't been a walk in the park. As of June 14, 2005, Alexisonfire made a statement on their website (theonlybandever.com) that Jesse Ingelevics is no longer part of the band. The news story cited that things between the band slowly grew apart and that Jesse wanted to spend more time with his family and his fiancee. Former drummer of Jersey, Jordan Hastings (amiably nicknamed rat beard), is now the current drummer of Alexisonfire.
In between touring and recording, the band members still do not rest. Dallas works on his solo acoustic material under the moniker City and Colour whereas George and Wade have recently formed The Black Lungs with two other members of the band Jersey.
Current line-up
- George Pettit- Vocals
- Dallas Green - Guitar, vocals
- Wade McNeil - Guitar, vocals
- Chris Steele - Bass Guitar
- Jordan "Ratbeard" Hastings - Drums
Departed Members
Discography
- Alexisonfire (2002)
- Watch Out! (2004)
- Moneen Split EP (aka Switcheroo: Alexis vs. Moneen) (2005)
Music videos
- Pulmonary Archery from Alexisonfire
- Counterparts And Number Them from Alexisonfire
- Waterwings (And Other Poolside Fashion Faux Pas) from Alexisonfire
- Accidents from Watch Out!
- No Transitory from Watch Out!
- "Hey, It's Your Funeral Mama" from Watch Out!
All the band's videos were directed by Marc Ricciardelli. Although the band have used the same director for all their videos so far, each video is different. Marc Ricciardelli states he wishes to create videos that are unusual and that people will not expect for this type of band. For example, the video for Counterparts and Number Them has the band playing in a park on a beautiful sunny day while children run around playing. Waterwings (And Other Poolside Fashion Faux Pas) shows each member of the band in separate street gangs who go on to show off their best dance moves as they duke it out in an old fashioned dance-off competition. Accidents however, was a tad more serious than their previous videos and shows 4/5 band tearing through Ontario as paramedics.
You can watch all of Alexisonfire's videos here.
Also, on Sunday, August 7th 2005 Alexisonfire were filmed for eTalk Playlist, a show produced by CTV. The band was scheduled to perform two songs but hours of delays and audience dissent caused CTV to extend the set by four more songs. The set was 1) It Was Fear Of Myself That Made Me Odd 2) No Transitory --Encore-- 3) Waterwings (audience request) 4) A new song that George and Dallas couldn't agree on the title of. 5) Accidents. The crowd got rowdy and the show was shut down.