Pillar

Pillar – Fireproof

As I first grew into the Christian hard rock scene, Pillar was front and foremost on the list of bands I loved and listened to constantly. 

I still have lyrics memorized from the song above, Fireproof, off their first huge rock album on Flicker records along with many others such as Echelon, Light at My Feet, A Shame, Indivisible, Further.. It was an incredible rock album which they even had the courage to go back into the studio and re-record to make everything more huge and better sounding (I love both albums equally – the originality and honesty of the first, and the explosive sound the later provides).

They are a great transformative band if you listen through their entire discography. Their first albums, Metamorphosis and Original Superman truly captured the foundation and roots of what Pillar would become on their record label debuts Above and Fireproof. To be fair, I only listen to a small handful of tracks from the Metamorphosis days as it’s a softer sound but you still hear Rob beginning the rap/soul/singing style he becomes quite known for in later years. Original Superman had some even better work but ultimately lead to the explosive work in Above and Fireproof.

Where Do We Go From Here, their 3rd record label album truly cemented them in a group where I knew I would follow them for the rest of their musical careers. The main single from that album, Bring Me Down was successfully able to jump across the Christian label and land pretty high on mainstream charts too. Hypnotized, Rewind, Frontline, Dirty Little Secret are all incredible tracks and the relationship between Noah (guitar), Rob (vox) and Lester (drums) was just perfect. It’s my favorite album they produced and what I remember them most fondly for.

The Reckoning was a lost album to me.. There were a few cool singles, but I didn’t hear anything so distinctive in that span of music. For the Love of the Game was their next album and unfortunately when I began to lose real interest in Pillar – they had a great album-titled single and it was certainly cool to hear them on ESPN, but slowly the group started to lose some members, Lester, and Kalel and the direction of the band grew a little more into the screams style of music, which made sense given their genre and the way trends were leaning, but it wasn’t what drew me to Pillar in the first place.

Confessions, which they released in 2009 was the end of it.. I remember more of the screaming, not a tight sound and none of the great ‘album’ feel I had discovered from the group early on.. Though it did get awards and was generally well-received, I personally wasn’t as invested any more and consequently, the group stopped touring around 2011.

Well, the boys are back! After some quiet from the group, they did announce they’d bring back all original members and release new music someday, and that someday arrived back in the middle of August and I was super proud of what they were able to produce in One Love Revolution. It’s a great album and brought so much cohesion and fluidity. Plus, the sound is electric, full, and really well produced. It’s nice to have the group back and making new music. I hope there is even more music to come..