Protomartyr

Protomartyr formed in Detroit in 2010, when guitarist Greg Ahee and drummer Alex Leonard began playing behind Joe Casey, a frontman who was past thirty before he ever took a stage and who still performs in a rumpled suit, like a man who wandered in from a wake. Bassist Scott Davidson completed the quartet, and the four built a sound on churning, ringing guitar figures under Casey's half-spoken delivery, closer to a bar-stool monologue than a punk shout. Their preoccupations have held steady across six albums, from 2012's No Passion All Technique through 2023's Formal Growth in the Desert: decaying institutions, Catholic guilt, and the particular texture of American decline. A seventh, Hotel Usona, arrives in September 2026 by way of producer Dave Fridmann, with each song imagined as a room in a failing hotel standing in for the country. Iggy Pop, a fellow Detroiter, wrote the album's announcement text and has called them the best band America currently has.