Albums of the Year # 18 Protomartyr - Formal Growth in the Desert

 

I go back some way with Protomartyr. That fierce, defiant and special Detroit band. They've always been good to me, and others, and it's immediately apparent, listening to the opening moments of Formal Growth in the Desert, (remarkably their sixth), they remain last knights standing, or else sitting, (at their Round Table probably),  still resolute, devoted to the cause.

They were such a find for me, when I first came across them, just before they released Relatives in Descent , (still possibly their masterpiece, although I'll come back to that), in 2017. That was a difficult time for me. An older brother died in awful circumstances it felt like I was living through an actual nightmare.

Protomartyr at once seemed like a band to hang on to, because although their themes, mapped out with incredible personal honesty and courage by singer and guiding visionary Joe Casey, seemed relentlessly bleak, they stared them down with grim courage and belief that they would prevail and bring us with them. It was wonderful to realise that bands like this still existed. Could still exist. Like the ones in my youth. The Bunnymen, R.E.M. and The Smiths. Noble quests, crusades that you could sign up for. Something worth fighting for.

I saw them shortly after Relatives came out and they didn't disappoint for a moment. Casey was formidable that evening. A method actor of the old school. Brando, Di Niro, Pacino. An intense, scarred two hundred yard stare war veteran. Bottles in his jacket pocket. Like grenades waiting for their pins to be pulled and for they themselves to be chucked into the fray, into the heart of the enemy bunker nests to explode, and take everyone inside with them. Casey was furious in the true sense of the word, and his band were valiant.

They've been back at three year intervals since and it doesn't take long in the company of Formal Growth to know that they're battle hardened as ever. A crack troop. Theirs is a sound that needs to evolve if they're to endure. Relatives was a record that , remarkable as it was), was still build on unmistakably recognisable tropes of classic Joy Division and Pere Ubu. The band realised this and now their sound is much more malleable and fluid, difficult to pin down.

Greg Aheen their guitarist has in the intervening years emerged as a particularly notable player, a Starbuck to Casey's Ahab. Formal Growth is immediately a ravenous beast that needs to be caged if it's going to be contained in civilised company. It's not one to be played at dinner parties unless you wish to find yourself feasting at one another's throats before the main course is served.  It's fantastic and seems destined to become better and better with every play. It might by the end of the year be set to stand shoulder to shoulder with Relatives. Something I thought I'd never say. Protomartyr meanwhile are one for the ages. True forces of nature.