Songs Never Heard
A craft podcast that spotlights some of the best songs you've never heard.
Songs Never Heard
S1E12: Project 1 (Martyrs)
A character borrowed from history to tell a modern-day story against a decayed film soundtrack.
Project 1 on Bandcamp: https://martyrsuk.bandcamp.com/track/project-1
More Martyrs music:
Robert Howell:
My name is Robert Howell, and in this series I'll be sharing, and digging into, some of my favorite songs that I've come across while in and exploring the underground songwriting scene. Songs written by talented people who are creating music that deserves wider recognition. Songs that, unfortunately, most of the world may never hear.
Welcome to "Songs Never Heard."
A childhood friendship, an ominous riff, and an emotionally fueled burst of creative intensity bring us this episode's song. Let's Hear "Project 1" by Martyrs.
Martyrs:
At 4am Elser taps the cherry from his cigarette and waits for a red dawn
Chekhov’s gun rests in his lap, at his feet Pavlov’s dog nods along
To the countdown clock of an otherwise silent, empty house, since she's gone these thoughts have been stacking up, unsung notes in an unwritten song
Now someone other can suffer for what they’ve done wrong
Who am I
to contradict him?
Imperfect world
The perfect victim
If not he now
Then who and when?
Brave the winter
Of ill intent
His right thumb lingers on his left ring finger, he crushes a memory, stamps on doubt, lights another, puts it out and reads her last message for the final time, “I’ll be alright”
Sends a message to his mother, one to his brother then drowns his phone in the soft soap of the sink
It’s time to act he steels himself, don’t look back, there’s already been too much time to think
No sane jury
Would convict him
Self-proclaimed
The perfect victim
Any fool
Could have predicted
Pierrot muerto
The perfect victim
One neighbour said “He was a normal, guy, quiet, of course he missed his wife / They took her a month ago / She’d lived here years, so why I don’t know / Me? I’m not sure violence is really the answer / But I guess sometimes you’ve got to cut out the cancer”
Who am I
To contradict him
No jury would
Dare to convict him
Don’t want a martyr
Willing to risk it
Come for a king
You best not miss him
Robert Howell:
That was "Project 1" by Martyrs, the self-described DIY songwriting duo of childhood friends, Jon, who handles the music, and Michael who writes the words. The song's subject matter emerged from feelings of anger and frustration that Michael has had , due to what he describes as a sharp rise of fascism over recent years. "There's a particular kind of violence in the world right now that I wanted to discuss," he explains.
The song's protagonist carries the name Elser, borrowed from Georg Elser, a German carpenter who attempted to assassinate Hitler in 1939. But this isn't a historical retelling. Michael used the name as shorthand to instantly signal what kind of story this would be. "If you know who Georg Elser was, what he did, or what he attempted to do, then you have a much clearer idea of what the song is about," Michael says.
The song's incredibly well constructed second line captures the setting and the protagonist's state of mind with remarkable precision, and is but one of many examples of Michael's lyrical prowess. He describes the line arriving fully formed. "I saw him sitting at the kitchen table at dawn in silence, and he had a gun in his lap, and a dog at his feet."
Using the terms Chekhov's Gun to express the firearm's imminent use, and Pavlov's dog to imply Elser's impending action as a response to previous behaviors, tells so much more than four words, should be able to.
Their remote songwriting process began when Jon sent Michael the riff that would become the foundation of "Project 1." It was ominous, borderline aggressive, and it immediately started Michael on an atypical path. "I began making notes while listening to it on a loop, thinking this would be something different," he explains.
Michael's process involves filling pages of notebooks. Writing everything that comes to mind while the music plays. Once he identifies a theme or a subject he's drawn to, he starts writing more deliberately toward that goal, pulling from phrases he keeps for future songs.
As Jon sent more musical parts, Michael continued working on the lyrics and making structural changes. "We sent iterations back and forth until we were happy, or at least ready to let it go," Michael says. "There were probably four or five different sets of lyrics for 'Project 1' over the time we worked on it."
The song came together quickly. Jon seemed to have the entire thing in his head musically, and Michael was recording vocals just a day or two after receiving the initial idea. It was a lot of work done very intensely, very quickly. Fueled by the heightened emotions stoked by the track's subject matter.
"Project 1" combines spoken word with singing. An approach Martyrs have occasionally used since the beginning. For Michael, it's partly because he looks more to authors than lyricists for inspiration.
There's something about spoken word that creates a different kind of intimacy. "It can feel as a listener, like you're being addressed more directly and you're gaining more insight into the songwriter's or narrator's frame of mind," Michael explains.
For "Project 1" specifically, spoken word solved the structural challenge. The information Michael wanted to relay was simply more than a traditional lyrical structure could hold. "Spoken word gives you that freedom of form,” he says, "It's less confined, less prescriptive."
The choice allows Michael to develop Elser as a character with the kind of detail you'd find in a short story. Describing the countdown clock of an otherwise silent house, and the way Elser 'drowns his phone in the soft soap of the sink.' Richly written scenes that wouldn't fit into a conventional verse chorus structure.
Running throughout "Project 1" is a chaotic, unsettling sonic backdrop that perfectly matches the song's dark subject matter. Jon traces the sound back to a childhood fear. There's a low budget Italian exploitation film from the 1970s called "The Bronx Warriors," and its soundtrack terrified him as a kid.
"It was a mellotron playing a choir loop, layered with other era fashionable instruments. And it sounded like it was recorded on analog tape that had been left out in the Italian sun too long," Jon told me, "That sound actually scared me as a kid. These analog voices in that semi decayed state with a full string section and pipe organ behind them, warbling and flexing. It sounded... unwell."
Jon could have simply used a plugin to recreate some approximation of that deteriorated sound, but shortcuts are definitely not this band style. Jon said, "I found a simulator of the string synthesizer likely used in the film, added a mellotron, a pipe organ, blended, compressed, and then dragged the audio out of the PC and through a bunch of my hand-built guitar pedals, using some very ropey cables from, I suspect, 1994. After all," he joked, "those pedals took a really long time to make."
The repeating riff that runs through "Project 1" displays a spy film swagger that contributes to the mystery and tension of the story we're being told. "It was an improvisation over that vaguely terrifying choir," Jon says, "The choir, strings, and organ filled up nearly the entire mid-range of the song, so the riff needed to be in a higher register." But then, as we often hear when we dig into these songs, the unplanned triggered brilliance. Jon recalled, "For some reason, I started to play with some swing that really pushed against the rigid industrial beats. Immediately it felt more like a horn line rather than a guitar riff.
That horn-like quality reminded Jon of a specific song, "Battle Without Honor or Humanity," by Hotei, where horns double the guitar line. "I loved that sound," Jon explains, "And this felt like absolutely the wrong place to use it, so I did."
It's a perfect example of Jon's creative philosophy. A lot of Martyr's songs pull together elements that shouldn't necessarily coexist, but if he can make them work, as this riff undeniably does, they stay in.
The bridge in "Project 1" is dramatically different from the rest of the song, both musically and narratively. The chaotic backdrop melts away, entirely replaced by something surprisingly dreamy and almost passive sounding. And the perspective shifts, from Elser to one of his neighbors being interviewed.
Jon created the bridge with a specific purpose in mind. "Initially, I built it purely to create the musical impact of that last chorus," he explains. He succeeded. When that final chorus hits, it's so much louder than the bridge, it basically breaks the limiter, and the initial snare hit rings out like a gunshot.
For the bridge's sonic character, Jon drew inspiration from an unexpected source. William Orbit's production of Madonna's "Ray of Light" album. It's the kind of decision he enjoys revisiting. "I just love it when an idea pops into my head and makes me blurt out a laugh, or a giddy 'No, that would be ridiculous,' he says. It worked, of course, so he kept it.
On the lyrical side, Michael approached the bridge as an opportunity for outside commentary. "I wanted to shift in perspective that would give broader context to the events of the song," he explains. The lyrics have Elser's neighbor delivering generic platitudes before taking a surprising position at the end. An intellectual shock immediately before the music of the final chorus strikes.
The last line of "Project 1" is intentionally evocative. "Come for a king, you best not miss him." It's a paraphrase of a line from the TV show, “The Wire.” And Michael says, "It's always struck me as incredibly dramatic and a universal truth."
But what makes the line so powerful in this context is how it opens up everything this song has been building toward. The idea of Elser failing at this task is introduced as a possibility, fundamentally changing what we're left to consider. "We don't know whether he fails or succeeds,” Michael explains, "Then you have to ask yourself, did he want to succeed? What happens if he did and what happens if he didn't? What are the repercussions of an act of violence?
This uncertainty is intentional. Designed to make listeners confront their own responses. "Are we out here baying for blood or do we believe we can reach back to democracy through peaceful means? Are we interested in resolution or revolution?” Michael asks. He goes on to say, "I don't know, but hopefully the ambiguity encourages the listener to ask those questions themselves."
The song ends with an abrupt stop that Jon carefully crafted, practically cutting off the last word. A final refusal to provide resolution, leaving us on edge to contemplate the questions Michael poses.
"Songs Never Heard" is created and produced by me, Robert Howell. It's a tribute to all the seldom heard music that, in my opinion, rivals what you'd hear on the popular charts. If you're interested in having one of your songs featured, drop me a note at rrobhowell@gmail.com.
Until next time, keep writing.