Joseph Kevin Barry Casey[1] (born January 31, 1977) is an American musician based out of Detroit, best known as the lead vocalist and lyricist of post-punk band Protomartyr.

[3] He grew up on 6 Mile on the north-west side of Detroit, which he remembers as an "idyllic corner" of the city when he was a child; his house described as being "the last [...] on a dead-end street, surrounded by a school, a church, and a monastery."

Solitary in nature and fond of playing video games, he remembers being an avid reader as a child, treating it as "a competition [...] to see who [among his siblings] could read the most".

[7] However, while many of them left for places like New York City, Los Angeles or Chicago, Casey himself chose to stay in Detroit and worked a number of odd-end jobs after film school, a period during which "he drank, [and] got depressed.

[2][8] Kevin Boyer of Tyvek briefly played bass and later second guitar for the band during their early days, before having to leave due to a heavy work schedule.

[10] Aside from their 2012 debut No Passion All Technique - which was later reissued in 2019 to positive reviews[11] - all of Protomartyr's albums, including 2018's Consolation EP, have received widespread critical acclaim.

[12][13][14][15][16] On review aggregator website Metacritic, the band's discography (excluding their debut and including the Consolation EP) has an average score of 83/100, indicating "[u]niversal [a]cclaim".

[26] He sings lead vocals on the tracks "Rope" and "Slang Words" by The Gotobeds off of their 2016 & 2019 albums Blood Sugar Secs Traffic and Debt Begins At 30 respectively.

When Casey latches on to a simple phrase or sentence, it's hard medicine: "I don't want to hear those vile trumpets anymore"; "everything's fine"; "knock it down.""

According to an interview with Los Angeles Review of Books, Casey writes lyrics after listening to the music composed by the rest of the band.

[40][41][42] He has often cited Irish literature as a big influence on his lyrics, a Spin interview noting that he'd "daydream" in college of being to Detroit what James Joyce was to Dublin.

"[6] He references the insights of recurring O'Brian character, De Selby, in "A Private Understanding", particularly through lines such as "the night is an accumulation of dark air.

[50] Ana da Silva of The Raincoats compares his apocalyptic lyricism on Ultimate Success Today - with its "theme of things ending, above all human existence" - to Cormac McCarthy's The Road.

And being rushed and reusing a previous show flyer for the first two albums cemented the strong, simple portrait as my cover manifesto.He also listed his influences as follows:[6] I grew up with a bunch of Frederic Remington books which affected me deeply.