100 Greatest Songs of the 2010’s #60 Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – A66

Released : 2018

Touting possibly the most fame-unfriendly band name in search engine history isn’t the only brilliant thing about Pigs (times seven), far from it. The Newcastle stoner/doom/whatever metal quintet’s choice of handle – a in-joke gone too far according to singer Matt Batty – is possibly a nod to Black Sabbath’s late period classic War Pigs, a band it’s fair to say on whom they lean heavily for inspiration.

The A66 is a trunk road in northern England which links it’s east and west via high country. However, the song itself isn’t about asphalt or being stuck behind an articulated lorry. Instead, according to Batty it “Takes a look at aspects of life in which people can find themselves unnecessarily debilitated by guilt or even tricked by their own circumstances into suppressing and isolating themselves….There’s also aspects of where people look to distractions for salvation – religion, wealth, lust etc.”

Salvation doesn’t always doesn’t always come in a from we recognise at first: here Batty roars over a nine minute wall of noise whilst guitars thunder, the resulting potion like barreling down a lonely, wet blacktop at night with the real world locked outside. It’s time to climb up into the cab and feel the power.