Fucked Up

Fucked Up is a punk band from Toronto that formed in 2001. After releasing a slew of EPs, mixtapes, demos, splits and singles and their debut album Hidden World in 2006, they released the critically-acclaimed The Chemistry of Common Life in 2008. Chemistry won them the 2009 Polaris Music Prize as Canada's top album. They followed it up with the Concept Album David Comes To Life in 2011.

While labeled as a Hardcore Punk band by some, they are occasionally seen as more experimental due to their expansive sound and use of different song structures.

Members

• Damian "Pink Eyes" Abraham - vocals
• Mike "10,000 Marbles" Haliechuk - lead guitar
• Sandy "Mustard Gas" Miranda - bass
• Josh "Concentration Camp" Zucker - rhythm guitar
• Ben "Young Governor" Cook - touring guitarist/backing vocals
• Jonah "Guinea Beat" Falco - drums

Discography:

• Hidden World (2006)
• The Chemistry of Common Life (2008)
• David Comes To Life (2011)
• Glass Boys (2014)
• Dose Your Dreams (2018)

And an extensive list of 12"s, singles, EPs, demos, mixtapes, splits, and tapes, listed at Wikipedia.

Fucked Up provides examples of the following tropes:

• Careful with That Axe: While Damian does this in many of his songs, the best example is in "Son The Father", which starts off with a flute solo, followed by rising guitars, and ending with a loud WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHH!!!
• Concept Album: In David Comes To Life, the titular character meets and falls in love with a girl named Veronica. After a short, blissful courtship, she dies in a bomb blast. Eventually he meets another character, Vivian, who tells him he should not trust narration, bringing the narrator of the story, Octavius, into the story. David and Octavius argue, leading to Octavius realizing he was wrong. However, since they all have their roles, Octavius does realize that he's only doing his role as the narrator, and Veronica had to die. Vivian then reveals that she was in love with David, but her love was not returned. However, unlike David, she uses the rejection as fuel to keep her going. David realizes this, and after meeting with the spirit of Veronica in a dream, he decides to learn and embrace this experience and keep living his life.
• Epic Rocking: The once a year "Zodiac Series" singles. The last one "Year of the Ox" in 2010, lasts more than 11 minutes.
  • Their 12-hour show in 2008.
• Genius Bruiser: Lead singer Damian is actually very well-spoken, and has even appeared on Fox News.
• Hey, It's That Guy!: Sebastien Grainger (Death From Above 1979), Dallas Green (Alexisonfire/City and Colour), Kate Stelmanis, and Vivian Girls make appearances on The Chemistry of Common Life.
• Inaction Video: Done twice, for Magic Word and Black Albino Bones.
• Once a Season: The Zodiac Series, where they release an Epic Rocking single and name it after that year in the Chinese Zodiac (i.e. "Year of the Rat" in 2009, "Year of the Ox" in 2010).
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits
• Something Completely Different: Along with David Comes To Life, the band released David's Town, a companion album of a compilation of fictional first-wave punk bands from David's "hometown". It's better than it sounds and they even made a music video for one of the songs.
  • The band itself can count as this, since they incorporate instruments seldom used by other punk bands (i.e. bongos in "Magic Word").
• Trash the Set: Their performance on MTV Live in 2008, where they trashed one of MTV's bathrooms, and got banned from MTV for it.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Earlier interviews painted them as this, but as of late, things are on friendlier terms.