PROTEST THE HERO LYRICS

1. Tidal

Awake, unfazed
Morning light tells of the dawning day
Just like any other day
Brush off sleep’s touch
Clear midnight's haze
There’s nothing extraordinary here
A flaccid world, unfit, unclear
Desperate for something more
Something more than getting by

Empty faces on the sidewalk
Listless and limping to a lie
Of a bright and pleasant future
Of a blue and cloudless sky
A phantom whisper sounds deceiving
It brings with it the question “why?”
We work until we are unable
Then locked away until we die

But then it happened
Everything changed in but an instant
A violent burst of brilliant colour
Somehow close and somehow distant

From a whisper
To a scream
To a hoarse, distorted laugh
There is no hope of restitution
There is no ever going back

In dreamless sleep
One ponders death
Hold back the fleeting final breath
Knuckle white, slipping grip
Jaw clenched tight, and quivering lip
This cannot happen
This cannot be
Escape a life of anonymity
To be a drop into the sea, a drop into the sea

Whose ripple turns to tidal wave
That sweeps the shores it once forgave
But crashing down upon the shore
The sea is silent evermore

Awake, unfazed
Morning light tells of the dawning day
Just like any day.
Brush off sleep’s touch
Clear midnight's haze
There’s nothing extraordinary here
A flaccid world, unfit, unclear
Desperate for something more
Something more than getting by

There’s got to be something more than this
It sounds so deceiving
Begging the question “why?”
Begging the question “why?”
Why do we work until we are unable?
Why do we work until we die?
Why do we work until we are unable?
Why, why, why do we work, why do we work until we die?

(A drop into the sea
Whose ripple turns to tidal wave,
And sweeps the shores it once forgave)

The Sun, the Moon, the Earth
Conversed and agreed
The people of the world must pay for its atrophy
But crashing down upon the shore
The sea is silenced evermore

Evermore…

But then it happened
Everything changed in but an instance
A violent burst of brilliant color

Somehow close and somehow distance [4x]

The sun, the moon, the Earth
Conversed and agreed
The people of the world must pay for its atrophy

(What unknown face now breaks the silence?)

(What tipping force disturbs the balance?)

(Swift and sober, comes a voice, offering a bitter choice)

2. Ragged Tooth

What unknown face now breaks the silence?
What tipping force disturbs the balance?
Swift and sober, comes a voice, offering a bitter choice
Take up a crime and serve the sentence, offer up a final penance
Or dismantle colossus from deep inside, conspirators,
and those allied

Gifts of bronze, iron, obsidian, from nave to chop,
plunged and hidden
Deep in the chests of those who cry, the songs of gods untrue

(The glowing eyes that burn like embers, fall painful on the skin
Seething with hatred, and writhing in pain, they cast a ghastly grin)

Like sulfur set to fire, blue flame is born
To rip through homes and cleanse the town
A new world rendered, an old world mourned

It draws closer with every step. (Push off with both feet
fall into the chasm, which will consume all)
March not to the drum, but off the beat. (Push off with both feet
fall into the chasm, which will consume all)

Burst into the evening, cool air burns the lungs
Fear not the turning heads, the darting glances, the lashing tongues

Turning heads, the darting glances, the lashing tongues
Glowing eyes that burn like embers

Fall painful on the skin
Glowing eyes, fall painful on the skin

Those glowing eyes, burn like embers, fall painful on the skin
Seething with hatred, they cast a ghastly grin
Yet among the faces shrouded in horror, one truth prevails
All who’ve ever come this far exclusively have failed

Reach for the hand whose grasp is firm,
Whose blistered palms can confirm,
A kinship in a spiteful place,
with tender touch a warm embrace

Though nights turn long and cold, and the warmth of the day escapes
The long dark shadows growing old, form familiar shapes

3. Cold Water

Twisting through contorted limb
Sober now from distant whim
Batten down the hatches
The storm approaches, the thunder crashes
It cannot wait
It must be now
A shot’s been fired across the bow
What presence here has been proclaimed?

What once was unspoken is finally named

So this is sinking, or so it seems
Diving fathoms in lucid dreams
With lungs now aching, begging for air
And only cold water answers
With a cinder block anchor, hope turns to despair
Ripped from the womb and left to the ocean’s care

Cold
(Cold water) [2x]

So just sink, let go, slip into the depths
Let the pieces of a wasted life slip past the fingertips
Rejoice, exult, a fitting conclusion to a melancholy myth
A grave at sea, an absentee, whose presence won’t be missed

(So this is sinking, or so it seems
Diving fathoms in lucid dreams
With lungs now aching, begging for air
And only cold water answers)

Twisting through contorted limb
Sober now from distant whim
Batten down the hatches
The storm approaches, the thunder crashes

(It cannot wait
It must be now
A shot’s been fired across the bow) [4x]

(Picking at the bones that came to rest on the ocean bed
Whose subtle pose tells a tale of those that sink like lead
Summon the ire left hanging in moments that swings by the neck to and fro.
Assured by the light that there’s one way to go)

So this is sinking, or so it seems
Diving fathoms in lucid dreams
With lungs now aching, begging for air
And only cold water answers

With a cinder block anchor, hope turns to despair
Ripped from the womb and left to the ocean’s care

Cold
(Cold water)

Cold
(Cold)

(Picking at the bones that came to rest on the ocean bed
Whose subtle pose tells a tale of those that sink like lead
Summon the ire left hanging in moments that swings by the neck to and fro.
Assured by the light that there’s one way to go)

Picking at the fucking bones that came to rest on the ocean bed
Whose subtle pose tells a tale of those that sink like lead
(Sink like lead)

Death is callous, strange, and sudden
A pious, indignant glutton
Whose hands are soft, warm, and inviting [2x]

4. Cataract

Death is callous, strange and sudden
A pious, indignant, drooling glutton
Whose hands are soft, warm, inviting
Whose desperate advances seem useless fighting
Whose ragged tooth should rip through flesh
Which marinates in rancid breath
How quick one turns to a violent death
When cowardice remains where courage left
No guiding light to lead the way
Just rot declining to decay

The would-be hangman hangs its head
To find its victim not quite dead
But rising now from beneath the gallows
A driving force cuts through the shadows

Strike from the heart, cut to the quick
With no remorse it’s politic
With crippling blows to the body and head
Drip by drip until it’s finally bled out

One moment defines a lifetime
No one recalls the crawl or the climb
Or the trembling legs that take the first two steps
Or the moment the lungs decide to take breath

The darkness comes to life
Underneath its cloak beat the blood red eyes
Whose haunting stare leaves one paralyzed

This is the nightmare from which one never awakes
Laughing at the feeble whose whole body shakes
Who pounce upon the weakness and the past mistakes
Whose hands grip the heart and cause the heartbreak
So strike from the heart, cut to core
Leave only the sinew washed up on the shore
Sever the head of the beast with the crown
Never back down
(Back down)
Never back down

And as the light breaks through the darkest night
It finds the victor dressed in white
Rising now from beneath the gallows
A driving force cuts through the shadows

5. Harbinger

Sleep still and silent
Dream in stained glass scenes of violence
Claim the song sung by the sirens
Breath shallow and quietly

Stand before the corpse of the crow
Take up the blade that struck the final blow
Tear off the wings to refuse its ascension
There will be no reproach. There will be no redemption
For the wicked and corrupt at the end of its life
Only justice from the absolute with a flick of a knife

Back to where it all began
Tracing footprints to the shore
They lead into the ocean
Where the horror waits no more
In its place waits utter devotion
The current casting backward tells of lifetime past
The empty faces that once seemed listless have all now been recast
But when lost in distant thoughts, a sleeping evil starts to stir
Distracted by warm memories with vigilance relaxed
It seemed unlikely to occur

Tear off the wings to refuse its ascension
There will be no reproach. There will be no redemption

A breach in the bow would allow the craft to sink again
Reaching down to tear the wings from the crow conquered in complete

Experience a transformation both of body and of mind
Rearrange the constellations and define the undefined

The returned speaks in tongues once bewildering
But in its hands sit the wings and the dagger that say everything
Without a word it says everything

Tore off the wings to refuse its ascension
There will be no second coming
No forces for succumbing to
Just a peaceful place to final rest a head
The crow is dead

Go back to sleep
The sun is finally setting
And you can rest you weary head for now.

6. Caravan

Allow me a moment to explain
While you were sleeping the ocean wasn’t drained
But transformed

It yawned and groaned as it rose from its bed
It stretched; diluted and extended its head
And took corporeal form

At least in part at first
But when it encountered the Earth
It took a deep draw in, extended its arms, and leapt into the sky

It took wing over mountain and rode on the wind
It traveled the cities but as the sun dimmed
It grew fat and it cursed at the earth

In a thunderous rage
And a display of bright lights
It spat and began to give birth

The bloom is off the rose, at least for me
Dogs like me can bark, but the caravan moves on

When you finally awoke, a new ocean had formed
Through the clamorous night, through the magnificent storm
It fell from the sky to reform and preform
Its endless endeavor in its worn uniform

The Sun, the Moon, the Earth, and the shore
Tired metaphors played out before your eyes
Sedation, satisfaction

But to be satisfied and entertained
Without any source of intellectual gain
Seems to be what’s in fashion

Interpret the meaning
To mean whatever you want it to be
I’ve heard these same words fall from my own lips
It falls flat and I question its value
It falls flat and I question its worth

In a thunderous rage
And a display of bright lights
It spat and began to give birth

The bloom is off the rose, at least for me
Dogs like me can bark, but the caravan moves on

Better to light a candle than curse at the darkness

This is the confluence of narrative and naivety
Swallowing a stream of lies and empty poetry
You don’t have to be the one to tell me
You don’t have to be the one to let me down

A catchy way of saying nothing
But a narrative seems to allude to something more
With a purpose and a real direction
But they’re just words punched in a template
The same mistakes we made before

I, for one, am fucking tired
Of conceptions that bring nothing new from the womb
But if every story is the same
Then the rose has truly lost its bloom

Can you sing it back to me?

I can’t relate to this
I can’t relate
Maybe it’s your preference
But I can’t relate

“Where is the problem? We’re entertained.”
My problem’s the consistency with every concept made
Don’t just tell me a story
What does it convey?

“Where is the problem? We’re entertained.”
I want to feel something more than just betrayed
You are the problem
I am the problem

Are you satisfied?
Don’t be satisfied







PROTEST THE HERO LYRICS