Review
Pig Destroyer
Book Burner

The news that Pig Destroyer were to release a new record this year was met with much celebration, a lot of shouting and a resounding “fuck, yes, it’s about bloody time!” chorus from their devoted fans. Pig Destroyer have been extremely quiet since the release of their last full length, Phantom Limb, in 2007 and along with the EP Natasha in 2008, that was more or less that last we heard of the band. Averse to masses of touring and only hitting UK shores this year for the first time in FOREVER, Pig Destroyer are rightly lauded as grindcore masters and their reappearance on the scene was as exciting as it was unexpected.

Book Burner is as full of vitriol and downright spite as any other Pig Destroyer album and the elements that this band draw together to create their signature sound are apparent in their delighted defiance. Rolling in at a sprightly thirty-one minutes, Book Burner is over before you’ve really had a chance to take anything in and it’s a record that bears repeated listens as the Pig Destroyer style is one of narrative force and furious cascades of hate. J.R. Hayes spits his words over frenetic and often thrashy riffs that are technical and catchy and gloriously wild. Hayes has never sounded so fucking angry and his voice is the glue that holds this vehemence together and bridges the gaps between the occasional doomy guitar line that weaves its way into the tapestry of this album.

Book Burner is damn intense and is an experience unlike any other. Nineteen tracks of unending speed and aggression flow into each other with hardly a hint of a break. How these guys manage not to drop dead through sheer exhaustion is a mystery, the pace is absolutely unrelenting and it’s difficult to grasp how the human body even copes with the traumas inflicted upon it during the playing of such energetic material. Album closer “Permanent Funeral” outruns most tracks by at least two minutes, yet the passion and thirst for more isn’t lost for even a second and Pig Destroyer prove that the hype for this album is 100% justified. Ridiculous.