*** PROTEST THE HERO video interview & show review ***

Upon hearing that PROTEST THE HERO was finally going to play Hamilton on a day on which I was free, I contacted my good pal Lucas Hoskin in the band and laid out plans to meet and talk. I've been friends with the three core members since my early teenage years (aka 1994 onwards) because my brother was best friends with Luke. As you'll probably notice the video interview is more of a friendly discussion/reminiscing than an actual interview. We didn't have anything rehearsed and I hadn't even planned any of the questions beforehand. I was also able to talk with the two newer members and they were both very cool individuals who played excellently during the set.

INTERVIEW part 1/2 "The Floating Head"

INTERVIEW part 2/2 "Disco Fiasco"

It was amazing to see a room full of hundreds of people clamoring to get closer and sing along to PROTEST THE HERO's material and it was also surreal to see people (women and teenage girls especially) grasping at Rody, as I've known them for so long I rarely think of them as "stars" or something close to it - in the Canadian scene at the very least. There were well over 200 people there and the place was packed so I'd wager as many as 300.

Let's start with a little story at the Zegema Beach distro that I was manning. Some guy and girl come up to the distro and start rifling through and the guy asks, "What genres are most of these records?" to which I replied, "Screamo. But not the mainstream stuff. It's stuff you've probably never heard before. He responded with, "Oh cool, you mean like Saetia?". To this I raised my arms in the air, let out a short but piercing scream of joy and hugged the poor guy. They ended up taking over the distro while I was taking breaks and they bought some incredible ZBR records such as Via Fondo's 'Efter, Utan Under' and Vi Som Alskade Varandra Sa Mycket's 'Den sorgligaste musiken i världen'.

For those who haven't been to Club Absinthe, it's a two-tier building with the stage in a corner under very low rafters. It's a big environment but still very intimate. The sound, as per usual, was excellent and the security did an excellent job of maintaining order, which they had to put into effect during the single aggressive dispute of the night.

PROTEST THE HERO's warm-up was pretty sweet and I've posted a video of that under this text.

As per every PROTEST THE HERO show I've seen, there was lots of banter and general hilarity in between songs. I've always enjoyed their banter so I've posted a few videos of it in chronological order along with the set. The band also had a pizza delivered during their stage-time and were nice enough to share it with the security fellas. Here's a live video of Blindfolds Aside where Tim was nice enough to give the camera a no strum solo and a hefty beard caress:

The band played extremely tight and culled some tracks from the first LP to the new LP. The songs I recorded in full that you can watch here are:
- Sequoia Throne
- Underbite
- Clarity
- No Stars Over Bethlehem
- Blindfolds Aside
- Linoleum (nofx cover)
- Bloodmeat

For the "Linoleum" NOFX cover, Ben Rispin (put on the show, helps book Club Absinthe, awesome guy) jumped on the stage and tackled the vocals, which he pulled off swimmingly. There was a part where I stepped up to the mic and got to scream, "So what?" a few times which was nice, as Luke, our friends and I used to concoct drunken NOFX covers back in my university days at my house and record them. I just listened to one on my computer, bahahahaha. Well, this video is amazing and it had everyone in the room singing along. I was mad into it as you will see the camera shaking while I belt out the lyrics along with everyone else. A magical little moment.

You can view all 12 videos right here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! as well as the interview which is split into 2 parts. I've also posted the interview near the top of this post if you don't want to check the live videos because you're lazy.

Hopefully I'll have some good news about this band along with their review in the near future!