Killswitch Engage: Through Adversity There Is Redemption

A teenager quickens its pace after leaving the schoolyard heading for home. He is relieved for a brief moment finishing this day without any significant trouble. He nearly runs to avoid the company of other fellow students heading in the same direction. He is fed up with their stupid remarks, shallow stories. He does not want to chat. He did not even try to wait for the bus for the same reasons. He started to walk instead. At the first possible occasion, he leaves the main road choosing the smaller streets in the suburb. One turn right, next turn left. This way, diagonally, he gets home even quicker. His eyes are moving fast, scan the streets. He looks for familiar figures. Have to avoid them. Do not want to talk to anyone. They can bring up an embarrassing old story. They would notice that he is nervous. Blushes. Sweats. Trembles. His voice would close. If he sees a stranger approaching, he simply cross the street as if his route leads him there.

Recollections like this have been told recently by Howard Jones, born in Colombus, Ohio 20th July, 1970. He was 27 years old when he started his first notable band called Blood Has Been Shed, which allowed him to scream out all his frustrations. Their first self-released album titled I Dwell On Thoughts Of You aroused the interest of Ferret Records. They did a distribution deal for the debut album and then released the second album in 2001. The Novella of Uriel shows a much more mature metalcore band, and we find the first direct references to Howard’s religious upbringing.

In Milton’s Paradise Lost, Uriel archangel is one of the seven keepers, the angel of reverence in charge of the Orb of the Sun, who serves as God’s eyes, but unwittingly steers Satan towards the newly created earth. The second track of the album is not a proper benediction, more like a denial, but the song called And A Seraphim Cries is a straight biblical reference. The book of Isaiah describes them as six-winged mythical beings that fly around the Throne of God crying „holy, holy, holy.”

The average listener like me would not attach too much importance to these thoughts, since the third album titled Spirals released in 2003 brought more references to comics and movies than theological concepts. And there was no time for meditation, since unexpectedly Howard joined Killswitch Engage right after the release of their second album, Alive Or Just Breathing, because Jesse Leach left the band due to mental issues. In the middle of heavy touring, they started to write together, and in 2004 they released The End Of Heartache, their break-through album.

The keytrack for me was Unbroken from the following album titled As Daylight Dies. At that time I was already an avid follower of the band since I dug deep into the New Wave Of American Heavy Metal because Coheed And Cambria and Lamb Of God was working with Sony Music I was doing marketing for. Aside from the bands mentioned above and God Forbid, I loved Killswitch Engage the most. I remember clearly the moment I have heard the strange name for the first time. We were driving from Pest to Buda with Laszlo Lenard, the editor of Metal Hammer Hungary, who played a song from the second KSE album asking me if I have heard of them before. I had to ask back two times to comprehend the unique name.

„Forever falling, into oblivion
The darkness crawls forward
It engulfs, my will to live
Fear is failure”

A man of forty sits in the half-light of his old, old apartment in Connecticut. He is unable to move. Fear paralyzes him. Darkness does not come from outside into his room. It engulfs his mind. He pulls out his .44 pistol. He stares on it for long. Everything else disappears in the dark. He loads it accurately. Slowly, very slowly, he lifts it up to his head. His index finger is pressed against the trigger.

Someone knocks on his door. Police! Open the door!

„Someone knew what I was doing and called the police, they broke down my door and stopped me” – remembers the singer in Jamey Jasta’s podcast, and he does a great service for everybody who struggles with the same problems. It is frightening to imagine a person who chases his demons since childhood, who finds the solution through excruciating battles, falling back in depression. Paradoxically the success with Killswitch Engage pushed him back to the edge. The kid inside him, who struggles with social anxiety, cannot be whole-heartedly glad when people recognize him on the street, calling his name, want to take pictures with him. It is no accident that HOJO avoids even his bandmates. When touring, he disappeared at the back of the tour bus. On off days he disappeared. After the tour of the third, so far last, self-titled album released with him, he disappeared for good. This was when he attempted suicide, then he attended lengthy medical treatment.

„Through adversity, there is redemption
With passion, fighting
I am unbroken”

He wrote these fantastic, uplifting lyrics, but they have not helped him. It gave strength for thousands, but he needed the help of others. Thanks to them, he can tell his story. And this is an even more critical act, than writing a song. He stands for everything he sings about. He raises awareness that we are not alone. He talked about this in Jasta’s podcast, then they wrote and recorded a song together titled Chasing Demons, which was released in 2017 on The Lost Chapters album. Everybody fights its demons. He defeated his ones. In 2012 he joined a new-found supergroup called Devil You Know. After releasing two strong albums, he had to restart again. John Sankey, the drummer, left the band and claimed the band’s name’s rights, so Howard and his friends chose a new one.

Light The Torch.

A more descriptive name brings new elements to the album called Revival. New ideas, more melody, more light. And despite of the rebrand, the project becomes more successful than its predecessors.

And the most heart-warming moment of this story is the Killswitch Engage song called The Signal Fire, he wrote with Jesse Leach and his former bandmates in 2019. Nothing reminds us more truthfully that our attention must not wane for a moment for those who are important for us.

„The signal fire’s alight
Alight (alight)
I won’t give up this fight”