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One of the most claustrophobic, suffocating records I’ve ever heard is Rorschach’s “Protestant” lp. This is the one they really left the biggest mark with. It influenced a whole slew of post-metal hardcore and post hardcore bands in the 90’s. Most were bad that missed the point I think. It’s a feel bad kind of record, you don’t really throw it on when you’re going for a Saturday drive to the beach or in the morning when you’re cooking breakfast. The music here takes cues from Black Flag circa my war but filters them through 10 subsequent years of thrash and death metal leading to tremolo-picked progressions and staccato breaks that follow the same kind of putrid atonal patterns as Swingin’ Man or Forever Time. Other times find them getting slower and more contemplative. Various write-ups of the band try to liken these moments to being influenced by The Swans, I find it to be a bit of a stretch. I think maybe the more out there moments on some Melvins recordings might be a better point of reference, although the overall atmosphere of the Swans might not be a bad point of reference. This atmosphere is one of anomie and alienation in the shadow of early 90’s NYC. A feeling of overall aloneness and aimlessness. The feeling of being a small piece of an immeasurably large machine. Like I said before, Protestant is a feel bad record, and if your spirits are not already sunk, this album can do the job.

One of the most effective tools used in conveying the oppressive mood here are the screams of vocalist Charles Maggio. The tale goes that he was having serious voice problems (I assume as a result of singing in this band) at the time of the recording, and thus his voice changed drastically from the way it was on previous Rorschach releases. Here it sounds higher, less intelligible, at times even screechy. In fact if not for it being such a perfect fit to the music I can’t picture myself really liking it much at all, but I think in context it’s a perfect fit. It sounds like someone who is isolated, someone who’s sick and suffocated. The grey smog and garbage smell of New York, New York looms over this whole recording in some way that I can’t quite put my finger on. Mabye I’m projecting my own ideas onto it, but I feel like the vocal delivery is a product of that environment. It’s like hearing someone choke on the exhaust fume air and cigarette butt ground.

Protestant is dense and affecting. For such an isolated and isolating record, it also was taken to heart by a great many people in the 90’s. Pretty much the entire subsequent output of the country of Germany in that decade owes itself to this album. And of course there’s Converge, Metallica to Rorschach’s Diamondhead (save your protests, it’s an analogy). Mr. Bannon’s primary vocal attack owes as much as their guitar attack to the blueprints found in the grooves of this vinyl, and they’ve at least repaid insofar as name-checking interview moments are concerned. Still, Protestant is one of the rarest of records where the bands it influences never can have the same feel, it’s isolated even from would-be peers.

The last song on the album is Ornaments. One of the all-time best closers on any record. It creeps along with a slow picked clean guitar playing like the background music to the moment of realization in a movie. Maggio’s screams are pushed deep down into the mix so that they’re barely audible, more isolated and claustrophobic than before. The song builds to a lumbering mournful crunch, slow and deliberate, and then abruptly the tape slows down, playing at half speed for the last unsettling 20 seconds. It’s the perfect ending. Like you’re hearing the record die.