Protomartyr - A private understanding

The pessimist philosopher is a recurring image in history. In Greek tradition, Heraclitus "the weeping philosopher" embodied that part. Even if we're not familiar with his ideas, we might have at least once heard of his famous aphorism "One can't cross twice the same river, because the river and oneself won't be the same", and while it is commonly taken by self-esteem groups and motivational therapists in the same way they use Frozen's "Let it go", we need to acknowledge the melancholy that such a phrase contains, the longing for things that will never be exactly as they were.

But the biggest contribution of Heraclitus to philosophy is his concept of "Logos", which, long story short, could be resumed as the rational knowledge and the universal truth. But being such a pessimist (or should we say, realist?) he tells us that us, human beings, aren't fully able to understand this Logos and at times we just decide to oppose it: "Although the Logos is common, most people live as if they had their own private understanding".

Protomartyr adjust Heraclitus' ideas to modern times, to the year of post-truth. Facts should be universal, but still there's people that decide to twist those facts to fit their own personal vision of the world. The lyrics are harsh and cryptic, but are a clear attack to the politics of fanaticism that disregard any kind of logic in their speech and in their ideology, and that even created the term "fake news" to censor the facts that don't suit their fascist agenda. "This age of blasting TRUMPets, a paradise for fools".

They make their reference to Heraclitus very clear in the middle of the song, and they go further by occupying his river metaphor to throw some shade in the Flint (Missouri) water crisis, where the Republican government gave poisoned water to the city of Flint in order to save money. It is a system that oppresses the poor people in horrible ways to keep rich people's status, and that know is vilifying science, journalism, arts, universities and intellectuals just to keep the things as they are.

But Protomartyr channel another pessimist philosopher in pop culture. Joe Cassey's baritone voice, that at times is more preaching than singing, immediately reminds us of Ian Curtis, that tragic prophet that once told us that "love will tear us apart". And the dark, tense music owns a lot to Joy Division, Gang of Four and other post-punk bands. The atmosphere is dense, the drums are heavy, the riffs are anxious, it is suffocating at several points, and the tension and dissonance they create can take us in a dark spiral of anger and depression at the current situation.

One might say that this track is way too intellectual, and that could be very right; but in times of "private understandings" we need to turn towards that rational thinking to face Breitbart fanatics. And if that rational thinking comes packaged in such a great display of technical abilities, we get a glimpse of a higher type of music: one that mixes art and philosophy.