Southern Lord seem to have left the doomy drones of their past behind, at least for 2011. Heartless continues the label’s trek into contemporary hardcore metal, and ‘Hell Is Other People’ is an expert splinter of the genre, with the Pennsylvania act tramping through thirteen songs in a mere twenty-one minutes. Not a second is wasted as they bring to mind the best of ‘Scum’-era Napalm and more contemporary metal-core activists Raspberry Bulbs or Bone Awl. Those with a need for pounding, guttural axe wielding should check immediately.
(Southern Lord Records)