Protest The Hero

Kezia

Written by: TL on 02/01/2007 00:56:25

Even while still suffering from the effects of some serious new years celebrations at my place last night, I am quite aware of how wrong it seems to post a review of a cd that came out in early April of what is now last year. So when I'm doing it anyway, despite all common sense, please try to understand that I do this simply because the record you're going to read about is A-fuckin'-MAZING, and you simply NEED to know about it.

Did you know, that when the Toronto upstarts Protest The Hero wrote the material for their debut full length "Kezia", they deliberately made it way harder than they were capable of playing, so that they'd be forced to improve their skills? If you did, then the sound of this album won't surprise you, because at first, it's almost impossible to comprehend the amount of stuff that goes on at once in the compositions present on "Kezia". And if the depth of the arrangements isn't enough to make you astonished, then how about the fact, that just about everything constantly changes at a breakneck pace, of course without any respect for conventional song structure. Vocalist Rody Walker is singing on the top of his lungs on a sky high level - reminding me of BEDlight for blueEYES - almost completely cleanly, while guitarist Tim Millar is supplementing with occasional well placed screams and growls. Throw in gang-shouts for good measure, and put it all on top of rapid fire math/metal-core being delivered at a speed and in a way, that I can only remember hearing from The Fall Of Troy (even if the difference in genre is still very clear).

On top of all the technical goodies are a sh*tload of passages that are just so ridiculously catchy that you're gonna sing along to them on your second listen. The attitude of the record is straight in your face roaring "rock'n roll!!!!" delivered through lyrics with intelligent political content.

I've already heard this record countless times, but I'm still not even close to being able to tell you how great it is. It's metalcore, but it is as far from the cliché sound that usually comes into mind at the closest mention of the genre as anything possibly can be. It's amazing in its technical details while still having the attitude of the really good punk rock. This record my friends, is to be brief, the SH*T, and you need to get it right fuckin' now. GO!

9

Download: No Stars Over Betlehem, Turn Soonest To The Sea, Heretics & Killers
For the fans of: The Fall Of Troy, Between The Buried And Me, Every Time I Die, System Of A Down
Listen: MySpace

Release Date 04.04.2006
Underground / Vagrant Records

Related Items | How we score?
Comments
comments powered by Disqus

Legal

© Copyright MMXXIV Rockfreaks.net.