Mainly Tuning Out: Protest The Hero

Canadian band Protest The Hero (PTH) dropped their second single from their forthcoming album Palimpsest on May 14th, 2020. I first discovered PTH through a friend I was jamming with, around the time they released their crowdfunded album Volition, which I still enjoy to this day. Honestly I'm only familiar with Volition, but the prog meets riff nature of this new offering really lands right in my wheelhouse.

"From The Sky" doesn't disappoint in the slightest. Musically and lyrically the listener is on a journey right from the get-go that goes from tight riffed conflict to angry and tense lows, to a somber piano/vocal moment, to a climbing guitar moment and ending on a majestic high with soaring vocals. It feels like a powerful rock opera packed into a six-minute timeline. Words that came to mind as I listened to it were tense, brooding, angry, nostalgic, apologetic, and majestic.

The word Palimpsest means "writing material (such as a parchment or tablet) used one or more times after earlier writing has been erased" (1). Given the strong narrative feel of this track I'd be interested to see how this concept pertains to the overall album as it is a curious one, especially with lyrics like "take the picture as I burn and print it out for all to see, because words are wind but image impacts our collective memory," and "when transitory memory became permanent, and we remember always as they pour us into molds, we remember because we're malleable as gold." There is a deep theme of consciousness, memory, being remembered/being forgotten, and fighting/coping with the fact that history will expunge everyone and everything from memory eventually.

This track has everything Protest The Hero has to offer and then some: excellent musicianship, soaring vocals, riffs for days, and lyrics worth pondering. Palimpsest is available for pre-order right now via Sheet Happens Publishing (see link below), and will be released on June 19th, 2020.