Albums Of The Year 2020 - #7

Also available: Rough Trade Exclusive bonus 12"

Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs are back with their most ambitious and hard-hitting record yet. Viscerals, their third proper is an enormous leap forward in confidence, adventure and sheer intensity even from their 2018 breakthrough King Of Cowards. Incisive in its riff-driven attack, infectiously catchy in its songcraft and more intrepid than ever in its experimental approach, Viscerals is the sound of a leaner, more vicious Pigs, and one with their controls set way beyond the pulverising one-riff workouts of their early days.

Whilst the fearsome opener Reducer’s battle cry “ego kills everything” brings a philosophical bent to its Sabbathian abjection, elsewhere Rubbernecker may be the most melodious ditty this band has yet attempted, redolent of the debauched swagger of Jane’s Addiction. Meanwhile the sinister sound-collage of Blood And Butter delves into jarring abstraction anew, New Body countenances a bracing Melvins-and-Sonic-Youth demolition derby and - perhaps most memorably of all - the perverse banger Crazy In Blood marries MBV-ish guitar curlicues in its verses to a raise-your-fists chorus worthy of Twisted Sister or Turbonegro. Yet Pigsx7 have effortlessly broadened their horizons and dealt with all these new avenues without sacrificing one iota of their trademark eccentricity, and the personality of this band has never been stronger.

Such is the relentless momentum of this unique and ever-porcine outfit; hedonists of the grittiest and most life-affirming ride in the land, and still the hungriest animals at the rock trough.