Pig Destroyer – Phantom Limb Initial Thoughts


I have decided that I am going to post initial thoughts and reactions on this album as I listen to it for the first time in a stream-of-consciousness kind of way. These thoughts are so initial that the album is not in shops yet. I haven’t even burned the mp3s to disc yet. This is a straight up reaction to playing the brutality on my crummy computer. I apologise in advance for what is probably going to turn out rambling and insane, but I thought it might be a nice experiment in the Initial Thoughts genre, and it’s fun to experiment once in a while. What follows is a document of my instinctual, unedited, reactions only given thinking time of however long it takes for a thought to get from my little brain to my keyboard. Erk.

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This is really technical, but absolutely horrible at the same time. and I mean that literally, as in it invokes a feeling of horror on a listener, rather than any strictly qualitative statement. There are bits of definite old school Slayer breaks, but with such a feeling of malicious intent.

Is a song called ‘Though Crime Spree’? Whatever it’s called, it’s probably the most impressive track yet. Well, it’s only track four, but it’s insane. Great drop-off to just the drums hammering out a beating on your brain, the guitars crunch back into action, and there is actually some melodic riffing going on. For a bit of context, their take on melodic riffing is pretty much on the level of the heaviest Pantera: I don’t see anything in the way of a ballad coming from these lads; ever. The riffs are great, and the blast-beats are insanely visceral. We’ve just had some inordinately high-pitched vocals, too. This is on the fifty-second ‘Cemetery Road’. The only word to describe this is that it shreds.

Onto ‘Lesser Animal’ now, and the switch from song to song is so instant and breathless, so devoid of anything resembling recuperative periods, that it reminds me directly of Converge’s Jane Doe. OK, a disturbo-sample about a man getting his face burned off, and that is our breathing space.

This album is so heavy that it is not a reincarnation of the shock-horror gore death metal of the late eighties, but a modern day equivalent; just as heavy today as that stuff was then. I can’t wait to get this on the Death Deck. The title track has a great mosh section, but even then it’s not that slow, and it has some Dillinger-style shredding over the ‘slow’ riff, and then the thrashy shredding comes right back to bite your face off.

While this music does sound very modern, there arte definite nods to the past, to death metal in particular, even while the strained-throat vocals recall the most boisterous of hardcore. Another great mosh section halfway into ‘Loathsome’. Great percussion, too, it has to be said – cymbal frenzy. No sooner do I write that, than a wonderful drum rhythm kicks in. the vocals have switched to that Kiss It Goodbye-influenced ‘very angry man trying his hardest to stay reasonable’ that is so much more satisfying than when you just get the angry in your mug. It provides a bit of relativism to make the angst that bit more intense.

All the tricks are being employed here, too. ‘Heathen Temple’ starts with a nice bit of feedback before exploding into what might be the fastest song yet. Things have slowed a tad, and this song actually reminds me a bit of late nineties Today Is The Day, and not just because it has ‘temple’ in the title; there is a great touch of ‘humongous insect’ vocal, and a gnarly, bassy riff. This might be the best song on the album thus far. This band gets through riffs like the world’s about to end, this most recent reminding me of 1986 Megadeth. Despite all this, though, they get away with it; it never actually sounds retro. This is probably because anything this heavy is automatically state of the art in metal circles.

The main reason I can’t wait to get this on the Death Deck, aside from playing it as loudly as possible, is to see exactly where it resides on the heaviness scale. Heavier than Dillinger Escape Plan’s Under the Running Board EP? Heavier than Jane Doe? Time will tell. Yeah, I think whomever wrote these titles hit a few typos. ‘Fopurth Degree Burns’ (sic)? I don’t think so. Great song though. There is a real At The Gates style urgency to the melodicism in a track like ‘Alexandria’. If this write-up is full of hyperbole, good. I’m not pretending to have any kind of critical distance here; it’s all about the visceral reactions being documented as and when they happen. Great chuggy mosh section about two thirds into the song too.

There is a definite sense of self awareness going on with Pig Destroyer, too, as they’ve called the current song ‘Girl in the Slayer Jacket’. I’d love to know what the vocalist is banging on about, because this one is particularly discordant and angry. Right, thirteen tracks in and I’m hoping there is not too much more to come. Not because it’s anything less than brilliant, but because this kind of album just has to have a ceiling of thirty minutes.

This riff on ‘Waist Deep in Ash’ really reminds me of the unstoppable marching that was the melody on Slayer’ ‘Seasons in the Abyss’, just with so many cuts into furious blast-beat that it’s taken onto a whole new level. The vocals remind me, again, of Tim Singer from Kiss It Goodbye and Deadguy. That is definitely a good thing. Onto ‘The Machete Twins’ now, and there is a definite throwback to the nineties on the serpentine lead guitar parts, slinking along the fret-boards all diabolus in musica like.

Right, the album proper is finished, and now playing is the seven and a half minute unlabeled track, in fine Coalesce swansong style. This should give me a minute to sit back and get a touch of distance on the album. It wasn’t amazingly hyper-modern, but one wonders where traditionally-arranged heavy music really has left to go. The band does well in melding the old school thrash and death influences with a metallic hardcore (dare I say Noisecore?) delivery, and it meshes well together, like an incredible heavy take on the Mastodon formula.

I have mentioned a couple of times about how the fast, energetic-to-the-point-of-overload type of music seems to have fallen out of fashion this decade, replaced both in rock and electronic music with the likes of sunnO)))/Khanate/new Earth on the one hand, and the critically unstoppable leviathan that is dubstep on the other. While that is all well and good, and I’m all for change, I was missing the music that just shreds and leaves you confused and motionless. We had Trap Them a few months ago with an irrepressible slab of speed noise, and now the mighty Pig destroyer have returned for the first time since 2004’s excellent Terrifyer with something that might actually be better.

Only time will tell, but if this remains no more than a tasty portion of fast fury I will be satisfied. I do think, though, that the months and years will to come will be very kind indeed to the album called Phantom Limb. And the music has just now finished.

I Guess This is Why that Song Wasn’t Called ‘From Atlanta to Paris’…


Sorry to bring the non-content, but I found this amusing. I don’t know how known it is on this here internet (I suspect rather well known, as I was just group-emailed it), but it’s the first time I have seen this, and it is amusing. The picture, grabbed by me, is part of a Google Maps directions search from Atlanta (Georgia) to Paris (France). Something tells me convenience is not the highest priority to Google’s directions-givers.

The WiLDHEARTS – Initial Thoughts


After being mightily impressed with the gig the other week, and the ensuing Wildies mini-obsession, I thought it might be an idea to treat myself to their new album. It is apparently good. So I got it, in Digipak format; the last album of theirs I had bought was released in 1997, so there was a little trepidation.

Of course, their performance of ‘Rooting for the Bad Guy’ was definitely heartening, and I was sufficiently cheeky to download their single ‘The Sweetest Song’ as something of a second opinion. The chorus of that one recalled Blink 182’s ‘All the Small Things’ but, despite that, I enjoyed the tune. I will go as far as to admit that the Blink 182 portion of which I was reminded was a pretty good bit, being as it was wordless vocal harmony. You see which bit I mean.

The initial listen to this eponymous album wasn’t overly positive. It certainly sounded to me like a good album, one that certainly didn’t bring shame onto The Wildhearts’ enviable oeuvre. There was just something about it that didn’t feel right. Dare I suggest it didn’t sound like The Wildhearts?

Whereas traditionally the reductionist rock media had always described the band as ‘pop metal’, the actual music was never that simple. Though the melodies and harmonies were unmistakeably pop (and we’re talking full on Beach Boys territory here, albeit filtered through the Ramones and Cheap Trick), and the guitars were more often than not metallic in their bludgeon riffola, the missing aesthetic link gluing the otherwise incongruous elements into a satisfying whole was punk rock.

Listening to such early gems as ‘Suckerpunch’, ‘Greetings from Shitsville’ and ‘Caffeine Bomb’ suggests little more than a band brought up on punk rock, recording in the early nineties metal tradition. Debut full length album Earth vs. The Wildhearts brought the pop, in the form of ‘T.V. Tan’ and ‘Miles Away Girl’. The melding of the pop and metal (with punk!) was then near-perfected on the under-rated 1995 album P.H.U.Q., which bore their trademark single ‘I Wanna Go Where the People Go’.

Back to the new album. The poppy melodies are back out in full force, which is a massive contrast to the literal noise-rock of 1997s Endless Nameless (we’re talking Xinlisupreme goes indie-strial). Present and correct, too, are the heavy metal riffs. The difference is the punk attitude seemed toned down on an album that recalled directly the cleaner sounds of Cheap Trick, Queen and even (a much better version of) Fountains Of Wayne.

Not that this was a bad thing per se, but it seemed as though the combination of iPod-friendly mixing, modern technology and various intangibles (a desire for mainstream success still? Forced sobriety straitjacketing Wildies mastermind Ginger? Who knows) had stripped the soul of the band somewhat, leaving in its place an eerily professional sheen to proceedings where once there was a trademark ramshackle spark of genius. The very first listen was a slightly tainted victory, then.

Another listen today has proven heartening indeed. It would now seem that the songs, poppy though they are, require time to which to acclimatise, for those hooks to really sink in to the cerebral cortex. Juicy! And I shouldn’t be surprised by such news: it took me a long time to appreciate Endless Nameless or Fishing for Luckies to the full (a few months) and it is only now that I can fully understand the nuance and depth of fifteenth-birthday-present P.H.U.Q. (another time, possibly later in what might reasonably be dubbed ‘Wildhearts Month’).

The main trick with an album such as this is to get to know the songs; after all, a catchy song is only of value when it is familiar enough to actually be catchy. The familiarity also aids getting into the longer songs (one of which, the opener bravely enough, is nine minutes), which recall the pop-metal-punk-prog of their magnum Fishing for Luckies set. That said, ‘Rooting for the Bad Guy’ is still a monstrous epic, ‘The Sweetest Song’ is still a catchy pop gem that unfortunately recalls Blink 182, and the compressed style of vocal harmonies still has an air of a much-better Fountains Of Wayne about it; perhaps knowing this is after all half the battle.

Fortunately, the trend suggests my positive affect for this album will grow with repeated listens and greater exposure. Most importantly, the soul of the band – Ginger’s wit and personality – does shine through from time to time, whether it’s in the ‘I wanted Tweety Pie crucified / I wanted Thunderbirds Kentucky Fried…’ opening chorus, the random tech-prog moments or the fact that he named the best song on the album ‘The Revolution Will Be Televised’ (and I don’t think there has been a political song this catchy since ‘Today’s Empires, Tomorrow’s Ashes’ by Propagandhi). Is it their best album? Only time will tell, but I lean toward ‘no’. It is, however, a quality rock album when so few bands in the spotlight are any good at all.

Postscript: As of the 17th May, this album is really, really good. Proper review in a bit.

Live Review: The WiLDHEARTS, 2nd May 2007

Leeds Rio’s. Support: Sign, G.U. Medicine

Without too much in the way of exposition I will just say that this was the best gig I have been to in a long time. That fact is made more impressive by the context in which it is written: I have been going to quite a few gigs of late (some of which are still in the writing process, like Blood Brothers, Propagandhi and the mighty Josh T. Pearson).

Not only was this a hell of a gig, but it was my most eagerly awaited in a long, long time. It was certainly on an eager anticipation par with Fugazi in 2002 and Tool in 2001, and largely due to their being one of my favourite bands growing up. They originally split in late 1997, and I kind of ignored their reformation earlier this decade because it all seemed a bit weird to me; I wasn’t a fan of what seemed to be empty nostalgia or whatever it was.

Anyway, Probot pulled me back into the rock mix, age has led to something of a late nineties revival in my listening (not to mention the stagnation of guitar music recently, but that’s for another day), and South Shields’s finest have returned once more, with a new album but, more importantly, a tour. Given my recent reminiscy-month for Kerbdog, I got to thinking that, not only were the Wildhearts the most under-rated British rock band of the decade, but quite probably also the best. Go on: who was better?

I had meant to go listening crazy for the band as the gig loomed. However, my temporal awareness is about on par with a punch-drunk Siamese fighting fish, so the gig rocked up all too soon for me to prepare. Like the last twelve years hadn’t been preparation enough. That said I was a tad concerned that, two days earlier, they had released a new album. The dreaded new album. How many old favourites were they going to play?

Before all that, though, there were support bands. Being super-cool and jaded, we decided nuts to the openers, and we might as well roll up for the ‘extra special guests’, whomsoever they might happen to be. And you never know when a band is going to come on nowadays.

This was the first time I attended a gig at the new Leeds Rio’s. the Bradford original had hosted a ton of my favourite gigs (from Neurosis to Iron Monkey), so there was a storied history to live up to. I have to admit, the new venue is a ton better than the Braddy one. Not only is it actually in my city, but the dance floor is longer than it is wide (sure, that’s taken for granted by many gig-goers, but they obviously haven’t been to Bradford Rio’s. It was an insane semi circle facing the stage, surrounded by pillars. Not a place to get drunk in). It also used to be a camp night club, so it’s in weirdly good condition for what is now a rock venue. Time will see to that.

Much like the Propagandhi gig (to be posted at some point before the world explodes), this was an event at which there were numerous people from one’s past, the kind of people you had no idea still lived near you. I love the fact that I have aged better than everybody I knew back in the day.

The first band we saw turned out to be Sign, from Iceland. When the androgynous vocalist (a refreshing sight in this age of rocks re-laddening) said their name, I thought he was just boasting about being signed, in much the same way that James Hetfield did in that famous Metallica footage from 1983. You know, when he holds their first twelve inch above his head and declares its release on Megaforce Records. Anyway, he wasn’t saying they were signed, but Sign.

Musically I was quite intrigued as to how they’d turn out, seeing as most of the band looked like roadies. It was like being a time warp, and rather a pleasant one. Sure enough, the music began in a very chugging, old school manner. The riffs sounded almost pre Guns N’ Roses in that the music lacked that punky bite. That was until the vocals kicked in; it was almost the moment when most in attendance decided they either loved or hated the band.

See, the vocals were high pitched and unapologetic. They were powerful without distorting in that cool Chris Cornell/JohnGarcia way. No, they were trad as fuck, recalling directly the pretty faced young singer of Skid Row, Sebastian Bach. That first song, with me still reeling from the vocal revelation was excellent. The set went on, I got used to their sound, but it was engaging throughout. If all goes well, I envisage this band filling venues far bigger than Rio’s in the next few years; certainly if Bam Margera ever catches wind of them. The set concluded with ‘a song we should all know’. And sure enough, I recognised it instantly. It seems my earlier comparison to Skid Row was not without merit, as they reached crescendo with that bands anthem ‘Youth Gone Wild’. I question the wisdom of covering such a well known song, but it certainly cooks live.

I have no idea what G.U. Medicine sounded like, as I missed them. Then again, they apparently hail from Barnsley, so I wonder whether ‘missed’ is actually an appropriate term.

And so we reach the main event. I had actually wanted to see the band in 1995 (at the now long defunct Town and Country Club as I recall), but was actually too scared to do so. I forget where I got this information, but their gigs were alleged to be very violent and I was a skinny fourteen year old with no gig experience. Suffice it to say the impending set was a long time coming.

And they kicked of with a dreaded New Song! Well, it wasn’t that new but, for the purposes of this event, anything released after their original split in the nineties counts as something I don’t know, ergo bad news. And it was ‘Vanilla Radio’. I knew this one through downloading their live album The Wildhearts Strike Back, and it’s a good song so I’ll have to buy The Wildhearts Must Be Destroyed at some point in the near future. I figure that, for the next time I see them, the promotion of songs-I-don’t-know to songs-I-know would be a wise step.

Thankfully the second song was old favourite ‘Caffeine Bomb’, which is very old (I have liked it since 1994) and very favoured indeed. It is one of the fastest songs they did (although I reckon the fastest would have to be ‘Moodswings and Roundabouts’, which didn’t get an airing), and perfect to get everyone into the gig as it mixes nostalgia with insane amounts of energy. It also represented the first of numerous trips into the pit. These trips are characterised by a complete lack of recollection as the moment is all that counts here. I remember very little about my very favourite sets historically.

I didn’t leave the pit when ‘caffeine Bomb’ finished because it was time for another old gem ‘T.V. Tan’. I reckon it’s pertinent to point out now that I was mainly hankering for songs from my fave two Wildies albums P.H.U.Q. (1995) and Fishing for Luckies (1996). So the count thus far: no songs played, because ‘T.V. Tan’ is off their accepted best album (but that’s incorrect) Earth vs. the Wildhearts.

‘Someone Who Won’t Let Me Go’ and ‘The Revolution Will Be Televised’ were next up and they kinda passed me by, though I enjoyed them for what they were. The latter is off the new album and impressed. I sound like a right old fart at this stage, but I was really happy when ‘Suckerpunch’ came on; I really was expecting to be familiar with most of the set but what can you do. ‘Suckerpunch’ is another high-octane tune, with a great and infectious rhythm to the verses. I don’t know what Ginger’s singing during these, so I bounced around the pit making up noises to fit the music. Fun was had indeed. The count: Still none.

‘Nexus Icon’ was another comeback-era song, and one that I can see myself liking a lot more in due course. Big deal anyway, because the next song was ‘Sick of Drugs’! This was on the redux Fishing for Luckies album (yeah, long story). ‘Sick of Drugs’ is an awesome blast of heavy pop-punk, and it was actually a bigger hit than I remember, reaching number fourteen in our singles charts. Awesome.

Next was song-I-know-but-not-that-well ‘Everlone’ and new stuff ‘Top of the World’ (a top thirty hit – I suck) and b-side ‘O.C.D.’. Hey, at least I’ll know all this stuff next time round. If there is a next time… Another post-comeback single ‘Stormy in the North, Karma in the South’ (top twenty!) came and went before, thankfully, ‘My Baby Is a Headfuck’ provided sanctuary. So, with the end of set proper, the wish list song count stands at a measly one. Hmph.

Obligatory encore hate. There is a glorious fake sing-along at the end of P.H.U.Q. known as ‘Don’t Worry ‘Bout Me’. It’s really catchy stuff, and I often catch myself singing it around the house. I think it’s tradition to do so before a Wildhearts encore, but I couldn’t bring myself to; this was partly because I hate encores and partly because the rest of the audience couldn’t get it together enough to reach any semblance of unison. Only the second song off the new album, ‘Rooting for the Bad Guy’ was first encore song, and it’s a bloody epic. It felt like one of those great, weirdly proggy, Fishing for Luckies tunes and is nine minutes long. I can’t wait to get that on the Death Deck.

And finally, the very last song of the night was their best, their flagship single, and easily one of the ten best British singles of the nineties: ‘I Wanna Go Where the People Go’. I can’t honestly say I was surprised because I expected it to either start or end the set. Anyway, it was magnificent. All I really recall about it is rocking out massively, completely knackering myself out in the pit but swearing to stick with it on account of it was the end of the set, and the distinct lack of backing vocals. That and it was unbelievably enjoyable. And, all told, the wish list song count was two; one from each album. Better than nothing, I suppose.

The band themselves were on fine form. Ginger was obviously the centre of attention, and was a great frontman. While he dissed sobriety (I don’t agree with him, but he is pretty drugular so I can’t stay mad), he also brought the comedy, largely directed at W.A.S.P., who played Rio’s shortly before tonight. The new bassist Scott Sorry was a source of confusion for me, as he kinda looked like original bass player Danny McCormack and kinda didn’t. Trivia fans: he was in Amen, which was a pretty under-rated punk rock band that got accused of being nu-metal.

I was hoping to see them a few times on this tour, as they played Sheffield and Manchester on the nights after this, but the ticket prices proved a substantial stumbling block. It gives me time to swot up on the tunes I didn’t know for the next tour; I’ll start with buying the new album. Ginger was rather gutted when I raised my hand as one of the punters who hadn’t already bought it, but what can I say? I got the Melt-Banana album that week instead.

I stole the setlist from here. I never remember the things myself.