The Protomen
The Protomen are an American rock band who compose and perform rock opera concept albums with science fiction themes inspired by video games. The band formed in 2003 and is based out of Nashville, Tennessee. They first gained exposure with their 2005 self-titled debut rock opera album The Protomen. The act is one of the most renowned in the video game music and geek rock genres. They are one of the highest paid novelty stage acts out of Nashville.
In the Protomen's three act rock opera, an Orwellian city is ruled by a fascist figure named Dr. Albert Wily who builds and controls a robot army, with which he has taken over the city. Protagonists attempt to defeat Wily's forces and repeatedly fail. While two acts are tragedies, continuing rebellion against tyranny and remaining hopeful are core themes. Act II: The Father of Death is a prequel to The Protomen and was released in 2009. The third act, Act III: This City Made Us, was released on January 9, 2026. The band tours performing the rock opera in character and only uses aliases while performing. Audience participation and strong audience responses are a significant part of their performances. Critical response to their music and performances is mostly positive. The Protomen tour extensively and are known for performing at festivals and headlining fan conventions, especially MAGFest.
Outside of the Protomen's rock opera, they have released two cover albums to positive responses, and have collaborated with other artists for albums, songs, and performances. They released single "Built to Last" as part of Capcom's anniversary album for the Mega Man franchise, which their rock opera is inspired by.
History
The Protomen formed in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Their name comes from one of the main characters in the Capcom video game franchise Mega Man: Proto Man. The band is composed mostly of Middle Tennessee State University recording program graduates, and originated in order to meet class deadlines and the need to record for their grades. Their first live performance was in April 2004. Most of the band had graduated and moved to Nashville by 2005.In a 2009 interview, lead vocalist Panther stated, "We basically gathered up all of our good friends from the local rock bands of Murfreesboro, tied ourselves together, and tried to walk. And somehow it worked. At the time, we noticed a void in rock and roll. A hole that could only really be filled with grown men and women painting up like robots and playing some fierce and furious rock music based on a 1980s video game. We were fairly certain no one else was going to fill that hole. But, by God, it's filled now. You can thank us later."
The band has strong ties to the Murfreesboro and Nashville independent music scene, and some members perform with several bands.
''The Protomen''
In the band's first album, Dr. Wily is represented as an Orwellian ruler over a dystopic city, full of humans who are too scared to stand up to his control. Dr. Light creates a "perfect man, an unbeatable machine", Protoman, to fight to free the city, but Protoman is destroyed by the overwhelming power of Wily's armies. Defeated and despairing, Dr. Light then creates a second son, Megaman, whom he attempts to dissuade from battle. Megaman runs away from home and confronts his brother in an apocalyptic concluding battle. The album has been described by the band as "the sound of the end of the world" and straddles the line between chiptune and hard rock, with heavier focus on distorted 8-bit synthesizers and electronic instrumentation.Band member Commander has stated that the album "was made specifically to go against everything our recording teachers and fellow students were trying to feed us about making everything sound pristine and 'perfect.'". The album was recorded over two years in various Murfreesboro studios, using analog rather than digital production techniques. "Due Vendetta", the group's first recorded track, was completed in April 2003. The album was produced by then-Protomen member Heath Who Hath No Name. The first CD pressing was 94 CDs, with the cover screen printed and the libretto booklet stapled by hand.
''Act II: The Father of Death''
For the band's second album the group, working with Meat Loaf producer Alan Shacklock, devised a prequel storyline to their first album. The second act details the rise of Albert Wily to power, the rivalry between himself and Thomas Light, and the tragic events which brought the City under Wily's control. The band stated that Act II was designed to sound cleaner, reflecting a time "before the bomb dropped". Accordingly, the second album reflects a much broader range of musical styles and more lyrical instrumentation, embracing references from Ennio Morricone to Bruce Springsteen to Shacklock's own Babe Ruth. The album was mastered by Richard Dodd. The band debuted a new logo by Version Industries. A vinyl version of the album was released in spring 2018 and reached number 24 on the vinyl albums Billboard chart.''The Protomen Present: A Night of Queen''
The Protomen are known for performing, along with their original rock opera, a variety of 1970s and 1980s cover songs in their live performances, typically related to the band's preferred motifs of heroism, struggle, and self-determination. On December 10, 2010, the Protomen performed along with Nashville band Evil Bebos for the latter band's farewell concert. Evil Bebos played a set entirely composed of Black Sabbath cover songs, while the Protomen in kind performed a set of Queen covers. The live performance was recorded and mastered, and on April 19, 2012, the Protomen announced through their website and mailing list that the resulting live album, titled The Protomen Present: A Night of Queen, would be released and was available for pre-order. Though set for a June 1, 2012, release, the album shipped early to those who pre-ordered it.''The Cover Up: Original Soundtrack from the Motion Picture''
In November 2010, while performing at InDisFest in Atlanta, GA, the band announced their intention to formally record an album of cover songs. Production on the album began in February 2011 with producer Alan Shacklock, the band's second collaboration with the producer following Act II. By June 2014, the band announced that a downloadable EP would be made available to attendees of their Warped Tour 2014 performances to promote the upcoming full-length album, titled The Cover Up. The EP was released via a download code printed on a faux movie ticket stub for The Cover Up, referencing a non-existent film, packaged in a laminate sleeve attached to a lanyard commemorating the Warped Tour. The full-length album was released on January 23, 2015, to attendees of MAGFest 13, where The Protomen were performing. The following morning, on January 24, the album was made available for pre-order to the general public through the band's website.The album is styled with a hidden narrative, being the surviving soundtrack to a banned movie within the universe of the band's dystopian three act rock opera tragedy, which is influenced by "Reagan-era media" like Phil Collins's "In the Air Tonight", one of the cover album's tracks. The album's cover art depicts a human hand shushing a damaged humanoid robot with its mouth removed. The back depicts a similar image with a crying human woman being shushed by a robot hand. A note on the interior says that the full theatrical release of The Cover Up was halted by cast and crew going missing after the initial limited release and that the soundtrack is the only part that survived, declaring "this soundtrack may be the only remaining glimpse of a work of fiction that tread so close to the truth that its creators must have ultimately paid a terrible price."
The Protomen frequently cover "In the Air Tonight" live to positive responses. Nashville Scene enthused: "They nailed that one, iconic drum fill and all." The cover of "In the Air Tonight" was later featured in the third season of Cobra Kai in 2021 and as a result was the 7th top song on Shazam for the first half of 2021. Use of the cover was positively received. Radio Times said "'In The Air Tonight' never sounded so good". The cover made Cobra Kai "so true to its source material" The Karate Kid according to Entertainment Voice. While Variety panned the use of music in Cobra Kai as "overdos on ‘80s kitsch", reporters Lily Moayeri and Shirley Halperin positively reviewed the use of the Protomen's "In the Air Tonight". Collider found the mix of styles eclectic but successful, saying "The fact that songs like 'In the Air Tonight' by The Protomen and 'Crank It Up' by Joey Valence & Brae can exist in the same soundtrack is beyond wild. Some wonderful needle drops here." The same cover was licensed for a Hugo Boss underwear marketing campaign featuring David Beckham that ran in movie theaters as well as streaming services like Amazon Prime in 2025.
''Act III: This City Made Us''
On Friday, October 3, 2025, The Protomen began the surprise release of their third album on Bandcamp. Beginning with the first two tracks, The Calm and Hold Back The Night, they have said that new tracks will be added to it weekly for the next "couple of months". The album was released fully on January 9th, 2026.Act III was the most pre-ordered album on Bandcamp in 2025, as well as one of the top ten bestselling albums and the number one best selling compact disc on the site for the year. The album debuted at number nine on the Billboard Top Album Sales chart for the end of January. For the same time period, The Protomen charted at number 4 on Emerging Artists.
Artistry
Musical style and influences
The Protomen's sound has been called "science fiction rock", a "driving, theatrical offshoot of rock 'n' roll" with "a little twist of sci-fi and video game effects" and the "fury of the hard rock hits of the 1980s, and the over the-top 1970s prog". Their conventional style labels include rock, hard rock, progressive, progressive rock, rock and roll, and geek rock.The Protomen combine a wide number of instruments and processes like synth, distortion, violins, choirs, brass acoustic guitar, and genres or formats including hair metal, arena rock, Americana, rockabilly, power ballads, and funeral marches. Critics describe the sound as feeling large or overwhelming, epic, passionate, operatic, theatrical, cinematic, and intense.
Their musical style appears to some critics to bridge mainstream music and underground geek rock genres. The Protomen can also be considered filk.
Reporting disagrees about whether the Protomen are part of video game-related music genres such as the Nintendocore genre. A couple sources use the label Nintendocore, but critics like metal database The Circle Pit say the Protomen are "distinct progress away from the trite and listless cliché of Nintendocore, towards something more resonant and fulfilling." Consequence of Sound classifies the Protomen as nerd rock, which Consequence describes as most informed by Devo and the punk, rock, and new wave genres, but excludes nerdcore. One blogger comparing video game cover bands in 2010 said: "they aren’t a video game band in any way, shape, or form. it’s not a bad story. It’s just that it’s not fucking Mega Man′s story, which means they aren’t a fucking Mega Man band." Their music and lyrics reinterpret the music, setting, characters, and plots in Mega Man games, rather than performing them exactly as they are in the games. Aside from a short tune in one song, "there are no direct musical references to the Mega Man series Someone who isn’t entirely familiar with Mega Man can enjoy the tracks". Mega Man's parent company Capcom concurs: "While there are a few nods to the in-game music of Mega Man, most of recorded work is closer to serious rock-opera rather than the 8-bit, chip-tune style of other videogame-inspired artists. In fact, if you don’t listen closely, you could easily miss the Mega Man influence entirely". Nashville Scene reported "You don’t need to know or care anything about ".
The Protomen do not consider themselves a video game band but recognize they are associated with the genre. In an early interview with The Tennessean the lead vocalist, who goes by Raul Panther III while performing, said: "It never really crossed our collective minds to play video game covers. Truthfully, we didn't even know there was this huge wave of video game cover bands until after we started the band and became irrevocably tied to them Honestly, it's just not for us. We love the music from the games and couldn't hope to really add anything by just playing them on guitars."
The group has cited the influence of "artists like Syd Mead, films like Eddie and the Cruisers and Streets of Fire, books like 1984 and Atlas Shrugged... those are the pretty obvious ones you can pull out of Acts I and II. But what you might not realize is that we own every Ernest movie ever made. And we watch them all the time." The band draws inspiration from diverse sources, including Sergio Leone's films, the song "The Mexican" and musical groups Radiohead, Styx, Toto, Queen and Alabama.