Volition, the band's fourth LP, raised a bit of a ruckus earlier this year when the group announced they were crowdfunding the album, and successfully raised over $200k in the scope of about 48 hours, eclipsing their goal of $50k faster than you could shake a drumstick at. Since then, the band has parted with longtime drummer Moe Carlson, and brought in Chris Adler (of Lamb of God fame) to record the remainder of the record. It's been a long time in the making, but here we are today, with a new Protest album eagerly in hand.
It should be noted that, for me, Protest peaked irrevocably with Fortress (2008). My nostalgia for songs like 'Wretch' and 'Goddess Gagged' aside, Scurrilous (2011) was never able to evoke the same feeling of "this is awesome" that Fortress supplied in spades (that being said, 'The Reign of Unending Terror' is awesome). Scurrilous' good songs were very good, but Fortress was consistently an amazing record. Unfortunately, that trend extends into Volition. Past the first stellar moments of 'Clarity' and 'Drumhead Trial', the album plays like a slightly heavier Fall of Troy record.
Now, a lot of people will read that and think "that's awesome!" and while I do think Volition does have its moments of typical Protest silliness - the song 'Mist' is an ode to Newfoundland - it's just not a very interesting record. Protest know their niche and tear things up a notch within that niche, and there is nothing wrong with that, but some of the only variation we get is in the form of a softer intro at the start of outro song 'Skies'. Otherwise, frontman Rody Walker's reliance on clean vocals takes off some of the edge previous Protest ventures employed, and while there are a few cool arpeggios and riffs here and there, Volition is a lot less technical overall than previous Protest records. And that's unfortunate, because lots of Volition doners were actually featured on this record in some form - the fact that the band didn't do very much with them represents a missed opportunity for me.
But now that I've talked about what I don't like about this record, what are the good parts? Well, the most notable upswing to Volition is probably the fact that, while I think Protest have done better, this is still better than a good amount of prog and at least 90% of metalcore. Protest's music has always been phenomenally endearing and, to a certain extent, charming, and thankfully the band hasn't gone full-on goofball or uber-serious yet, but there's still plenty of fun to be had, like a throwback to 'Sequoia Throne' on 'Animal Bones' with chanted "we are, we are still alive..."s or a song poking fun at fellow musicians on 'Underbite'.
To be blunt, there are no bad songs on this record, even if everything sounds a little bit similar. At it worst, Volition veers into repetition, which, considering the talent involved, isn't nearly as bad as it seems. The problem, then, arises in that there's no other extreme. As said before, there isn't any drastic deviation insofar as a few clean or slow breaks scattered throughout the album for ten or fifteen seconds apiece. It's not a glaring fault, but I know I for one would want Protest to experiment a bit more with their sound, as I'm confident they have the talent. That being said, Volition is not a record you will regret checking out - definitely a solid B- in my book. The wait has been worth it, but just maybe not as much as I thought.
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