Pine Barrens – Demo (2010)

In the past few days, my playlist has been dominated by a 4 track demo from a band called Pine Barrens. They are a hardcore band that hails from Manchester, England and beyond that, about the only other thing I know about them is that their demo is awesome (which is up for free download on their bandcamp page). Their songs are a curious mix of hardcore punk and black metal (while I may be inappropriately using the label, the shrieked/rasped vocals reminded me of black metal) that is both aurally assaulting and surprisingly compelling. Track 4 is the definite highlight of the demo, slowing down the pace a little and adding a second, bellowing vocal track that is hard not to get excited about. The song even has a saxophone solo at the end, but don’t let that fool you, this is aggressive music. Highly recommended. Download it, and if you like what you hear, it was just released on cassette from Big Mountain Recordings. It is limited to 50 copies, so it might not be around long.