On their fourth record, the bizarre magic of Detroit’s Protomartyr comes to an apex as they explore new sonic frontiers and get to the fringes of their expressive art. Within all this they also craft amazing songs that are just as wild and exciting as they are experimental, making for a record that’s worth everyone’s time.
Relatives in Descent manages to sound more thoughtful and introspective than 2015's The Agent Intellect without sapping the strength of this great band; quite simply, as a bit of record-making, this is Protomartyr's most impressive accomplishment to date.
Relatives in Descent builds on what the band has been doing since its 2012 debut No Passion All Technique, with Casey turning his loathing outward, and his band sounding bigger and better than ever.
A belief in the everyday people carrying on pushes Relatives in Descent beyond petty complaint, and closer towards perseverance and warmth.
Relatives in Descent presents a shadowy version of reality that is, unfortunately, eerily similar to our own. Throughout 12 tracks, Protomartyr seek truth and understanding, but a neat, satisfying conclusion never arrives.
Loaded with poetic post-punk dirges, Protomartyr's Relatives In Descent is the Detroit band's most dynamic and well-written release yet.
Relatives in Descent picks up where 2015’s The Agent Intellect left off, skewering modern anxieties with wit, dignity and thunderous fury.
At its best, Relatives in Descent makes guitar music feel radical again, capturing both timely and timeless anxieties.
A testament to post-punk’s paradoxically consistent but ever-mutating sound, Relatives in Descent tethers the influence of its predecessors to the genre’s current sound.
For those whose interest in the band stops just short of obsession, there’s something to be said for the punchiness of the earlier, more compact work. As long as the world keeps crumbling around us, though, Protomartyr won’t want for material, and Relatives is another solid entrant in a catalog well worth poring over.
This is the fine wine of post punk
Randomly scrolling along, I found this one because I was in the mood for Post Punk. After listening to this album for awhile, I have come to the consensus that this is great. There was some stuff I had to get used to, but honestly when this project clicks, it clicks pretty hard. Mainly the vocals were pretty weird with how stagnant they can be, but I eventually got used to it. One of the best parts of this band is the production. Dude when those guitars fill ... read more
Protomartyr have been an old band, in the best sense of the word, right from the start. It's got nothing to do with Joe Casey and co.'s actual age, but an impressive sense of maturity that follows the group's path since their very beginnings. They sure owe much to punk music, and got a lot of those disruptive aesthetics running forth in their musical veins, but, while going deep into a Protomartyr album, one is confronted not with raw, energetic, punchy antics, but with sheer intellectual ... read more
Saw them live a week ago... This man's got one of the greatest post-punk voices ever.
Fav tracks:
- Up the Tower
- Male Plague
- Windsor Hum
- Half Sister
- Here Is the Thing
Least faves:
- Caitriona
- Don't Go To Anacita
It took me a long ass time to get into this album. It's been in my library through 4 different streaming services (Google Play, Youtube, Spotify, and now Apple Music) and that amounts to like 6 years. For some reason "A Private Understanding", especially the vocals, annoyed me and I turned it off before the track could really get anywhere. In that time, I listened to a lot of other post-punk records and never really felt the need to come back to this. Then I gave "A Private ... read more
1 | A Private Understanding 5:18 | 90 |
2 | Here Is the Thing 2:50 | 83 |
3 | My Children 3:42 | 88 |
4 | Caitriona 1:44 | 78 |
5 | The Chuckler 3:43 | 88 |
6 | Windsor Hum 4:40 | 86 |
7 | Don't Go To Anacita 3:12 | 84 |
8 | Up the Tower 3:38 | 78 |
9 | Night-Blooming Cereus 3:25 | 82 |
10 | Male Plague 3:22 | 81 |
11 | Corpses in Regalia 2:43 | 80 |
12 | Half Sister 5:04 | 88 |
#1 | / | Loud and Quiet |
#3 | / | State |
#6 | / | Northern Transmissions |
#7 | / | No Ripcord |
#8 | / | OOR |
#10 | / | The Skinny |
#11 | / | musicOMH |
#11 | / | Newsweek |
#13 | / | Treble |
#15 | / | God Is In The TV |