EP REVIEW: House Of Protection – ‘Outrun You All’

With Outrun You All, House of Protection prove they’re not just building on their Fever 333 legacy. Instead they’re forging something sharper, stranger, and fully their own. The alternative punk duo, composed of Stephen Harrison and Aric Improta, push beyond the confines of post-hardcore and punk, embracing electronic textures, rhythmic chaos, and raw emotional urgency. This EP could not come at a greater time for the duo as it doesn’t just follow up their 2024 debut GALORE, it escalates the vision, tightens the chaos, and dares listeners to keep pace, building hype for their upcoming UK festival debuts later this summer at Download and Reading & Leeds. Outrun You All is a compact and calculated detonation, a sonic sprint that fuses hardcore grit with industrial distortion, emotional clarity, and rhythmic experimentation, each track dipping into different subgenres with ease while keeping the high energy signature we’ve grown to love. Every track feels urgent and intentional, a result of Harrison and Improta’s intense synergy as lifelong collaborators and unshakable live performers.

524å§ł€€°, the opening track of the EP left us mildly confused. The track itself is a cryptically titled 32 seconds that functions less as a song and more as an atmospheric gateway. Though brief, the track’s presence is deliberate: it sets an unsettling tone, like a static-laced signal beaming in from some unstable future. It feels intimate, coded, and disorienting, an audio motif that primes the listener for the emotional and sonic volatility to come. As a prelude, 524å§ł€€° doesn’t aim to impress with hooks or riffs; it simply opens the door and dares you to step through and it definitely piques our interest.

The first track that feels like a song is Afterlife, produced by former Bring Me The Horizon member Jordan Fish, and immediately it’s clear that this is not a retread of GALORE. There’s more polish here, but not at the expense of edge. A slow burn at first, Afterlife layers eerie synth pads and processed guitar swells before erupting into a chorus that’s more haunted than heroic. Harrison’s vocals are sharp and confrontational, but there’s a weariness behind them—this isn’t rebellion for rebellion’s sake. This is survival. Improta’s drumming, as always, deserves special attention. Rather than filling every space with technical bravado, he constructs grooves with tension and space in mind. Every fill feels like a choice, not a flex. The result is a track that pulses with restraint and pressure, building to a massive, almost cinematic climax.

The EP’s emotional pivot point comes in the form of I Need More Than This—a brooding, vulnerable track that trades aggression for atmosphere without losing intensity. It’s a moment of quiet confrontation: a song that sits in uncertainty and longing rather than charging past it. The production leans more into industrial and alt-electronic territory, with glitchy textures and ambient washes supporting Harrison’s most melodic vocal performance yet. There’s a haunting duality here: desperation wrapped in clarity, honesty emerging from distortion. It’s proof that House of Protection aren’t just good at being loud—they’re good at being real.

The EP closes with Slide Away, a track that eases off the gas without losing momentum entirely. It’s not slow in the traditional sense, but it does dial things back compared to the frantic pace of what came before, offering a more spacious, restrained groove. This shift gives the track a sense of reflection, less about explosive emotion, more about lingering weight. While it may not hit with the same immediacy as the EP’s standout moments, Slide Away provides a needed contrast, letting tension simmer rather than boil over. It’s a measured finale, one that subtly reframes the EP’s chaos with an in comparison calm.

As a whole, Outrun You All is a tight, urgent collection that pushes House of Protection’s sound forward without losing the raw, experimental edge that defines them. Across its runtime, the EP showcases the duo’s ability to balance aggression with atmosphere, chaos with clarity. Whether through the explosive energy of Fire, the emotional vulnerability of I Need More Than This, or the controlled release of Slide Away, the project feels intentional and alive. It may be short, but it doesn’t waste a second—Outrun You All proves that House of Protection aren’t just building a sound, they’re carving out a space entirely their own. This EP will resonate with listeners who crave a mix of hardcore urgency, industrial textures, and emotional volatility, all packed into genre-blurring, high-intensity bursts.

For fans of: Bring Me The Horizon, Fever 333, Lake Malice

‘Outrun You All’ by House Of Protection is released on 23rd May on Red Bull Records.

Words by Ell Bradbury