Coup D’état

Photo Credit 📷 : @iknowagirlwhotakesscenephotos

Everyone has experienced trauma. A moment suspended in time, where seconds feel like hours with no end in sight. Your palms sweat, your heart races, and breathing becomes a manual function you need to consciously perform. The deep emotional responses these moments elicit from our bodies become forever etched in our minds.

Sometimes the moments that haunt us the most aren't the ones we experience first hand, but the instances we see play out in front of us. Watching a stranger unravelling from afar, tethered to their pain but hopeless to intervene. Present but merely a silent spectator no different than a piece of furniture or painting on a wall, a footnote to another person's deepest tragedy. This is exactly what Victoria, British Columbia quartet Coup D’état have accomplished. 

Forming in March of 2024, Coup D’état are a four piece emo band consisting of guitarist/vocalist, Freyja, bassist/vocalist, Raine, guitarist, Elle, and drummer/vocalist, Lili. Coup D’état have firmly planted their heels into the BC local music scene and have released a steady stream of music since the band's inception. This includes a promo in 2024, followed by their debut full length What Happens After The Epilogue...? released that same year through Tomb Tree Tapes.

Following the success of their first record and growing recognition in the local emo scene, Coup D’état teamed up with fellow BC skramz band Lakeside Amusement Park for a split EP before embarking on a follow up to their highly successful debut album. The result is the self-titled COUP D'ETAT EP, released October 27th 2025 through Zegema Beach Records. Clocking in just shy of 15 minutes, this four-track EP is a wild romp spanning skramz, post-hardcore, emotional hardcore, and more, touching everything we so desire.

The album opens with "Amore Mio,” setting a bleak tone with soft guitars backed by atmospheric drums, gently layered with spoken word vocals akin to At The Drive In drenched in apathy. As the vicious guitar and instrumental pick up pace the vocals erupt into raw The Fall of Troy-esque shrieking screams and alternating back again. The vocal delivery by Freyja is like an emotional tug of war. A cycle between screaming to release all of her pent up pain, to the spoken word sections exhausted with frustration and physically drained from the release of these feelings.

The duality these vocals create showcases how, in such a heightened state of deep emotional turmoil, the lines that divide feelings of anger and sadness are blurred to the point that they're sometimes indistinguishable. The opening lyrics ‘I witnessed a dispute, 12:30 at night. Between a daughter and her parents. She was pissed in a language I couldn't speak,’ converts words into a cinematic that becomes tangible, allowing the listener to step into the scene and project their own traumas and hardships onto the unfolding events. This level of musical empathy transcends relatability, it becomes a shared experience, as real and impactful as any other memory the listener has. 

The following track "Lightswitch Scars" is a notable sonic shift from the album opener, kickstarting with an infectiously danceable guitar riff akin to Shed era Title Fight. The instrumentals slowly build over the course of the track before descending into Coup D’état’s signature chaotic sound during the song's latter half.

Despite the unassumingly lighthearted intro, the lyrical subject matter is deeply introspective, with lyrics like ‘Seems like my past can only dwell on me. Each day a reminder (of wounds unhealed) The fist it stings (don't look at me) Like the disease left untreated (I swear I'm fine).’

At its surface "Lightswitch Scars" is nothing short of fun, a song that perfectly encapsulates the wide range of musical influences Coup D’état expertly draws inspiration from. When looking past the surface, the raw emotional vulnerability detailed in the lyrics creates a sense of loss and forgiveness. "Lightswitch Scars" exemplifies why you ‘never knew what would come next on those cold nights in Nanaimo.’

Without a moment's hesitation "On Staying Put..." explodes into motion. Building upon the blueprint of emo originators, Pageninetynine and Rites of Spring, the song carves out a path set ablaze. Midway through the song the instruments almost completely fade, gently dissolving into spoken word before furiously bouncing back to form. The lyrics ‘Your eyes only reflect the walls that keep us here. Your eyes glow like headlights, my body becomes asphalt’ ... ‘I'm frozen in your gaze’ brought forth a familiar childhood dread.

Thoughts of Pennywise the dancing clown, in the form of a giant spider, shooting his deadlights at the once helpless group of children now fearless adults taking him head on. Facing what once felt like an unstoppable force, the personification of dread and despair, with a glimmer of hope. Fast, brash, and unrelenting, "On Staying Put..." is a sonic spin kick in the pit to your senses that only Coup D’état can deliver. 

The album's closing track, "The Cost of Playing It Cool" is an unforgettable bookend to Coup D’état’s juggernaut of an EP. The haunting guitar riff perfectly interwoven with a steady marching drum beat transports the listener, an eerie descent down a staircase, their heart racing faster to the beat, not knowing what horrors lie beneath.

Listeners of early 2000's chaotic metalcore will find themselves right at home, as the frantic vocals, shrieking screams, and spoken word sections form a sinister orchestra howling during the tracks ending breakdown. "The Cost of Playing It Cool" is a prime example of what makes Coup D’état one of the most unique bands releasing heavy music. It seamlessly blends elements of genres with common roots but branched off in different directions. 

Coup D’état’s self titled EP is a love letter in every meaning of the term. Not only to the wide variety of emo, skramz, posthardcore, and metalcore it draws influences from, but also the real depth to the very center of human emotion. Lyrics that blur the lines between sadness, anger, regret, and hope, dragging the listener through a cyclone of their past fears, failures, and ultimately reminding them that there is always a glimmer of light, no matter how dark things get. Emotions are a natural and involuntary human response, feelings of deep despair can become consuming.

The core message that Coup D'état masterfully delivers across this album's 13-minute runtime is that the capacity for hope and change is within us all, it's just up to us as individuals to take a leap of faith towards a brighter future. Coup D’état are wasting no time, spending the winter to write their sophomore full-length record before embarking on plans for a tour in summer of 2026.