David Frazer isn't afraid to mix and match. These short, pithy pieces grab snatches of Irish reels, hardcore punk, speed metal, Bad Religion-y oozin' ahs and tight, thrashy death metal. He wrote these songs, got some friends to help him record them and, well, Pillaging Villagers was born.

Pillaging Villagers Pillaging Villagers (self-released)

I am not sure how much of a going concern this is, but Frazer simply must put together a traveling band. I've never heard anyone fuse so many punk and metal ideas into a recognizable sound. The production is pleasantly chunky, and the hooks are astonishingly hooky.

The song titles leave a bit to be desired (four songs in a row begin with the article "the"), and while the growlier side of the vocals remain more thrashy than strictly death metal, they're not particularly intelligible. What's amazing is how easily the blistering verses transition into the harmonies of the choruses. The sound is so strong and cohesive that it's pretty amazing that few have tried to accomplish it before.

Frazer calls this "peasant metal", which is not too far from the ever-flowering folk metal trend. But his reliance on punk guitars and harmonic vocals set him apart from just about everyone. Need a comp? Imagine Exodus playing (short) Edge of Sanity songs, with Flogging Molly choruses and the occasional dip into Maiden-esque triplet bridges. Yeah, it's weird as hell. It's also totally, spectacularly awesome.

Jon Worley