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Pigpile

{{short description|1992 live album by Big Black}}

{{More citations needed|date=April 2025}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2025}}

{{Infobox album

| name = Pigpile

| type = live

| artist = Big Black

| cover = Big Black - Pigpile cover.jpg

| alt =

| released = {{Start date|1992|10|05}}

| recorded = July 24, 1987

| venue = Clarendon Hotel Ballroom, Hammersmith, London

| studio =

| genre = Noise rock

| length = {{Duration|m=46|s=02}}

| label = Touch and Go

| producer =

| prev_title = Songs About Fucking

| prev_year = 1987

| next_title =

| next_year =

}}Pigpile is a live album by the American musical group Big Black. It is a recording from July 24, 1987 during the noise rock band's final European tour, released in 1992 originally as a VHS tape (it was their second video release, following the 'Live' tape on Atavistic Records). It was later issued as an audio-only LP/cassette/CD. The recordings were made at the Hammersmith Clarendon ballroom, London. A 5" transparent heavy-duty vinyl record was included away free with all copies of the VHS tape and some copies of the soundtrack album, featuring a cover version of the Mary Jane Girls song "In My House". Lower-quality recordings from the Hammersmith concert had previously appeared in a different configuration on the bootleg LP Tonight We Walked With Giants.

Pigpile coincided with the re-release of Big Black's entire catalog on Touch and Go Records. A limited edition of Pigpile was issued as a box set that included the LP and its insert, a VHS tape of the Hammersmith concert, the "In My House" one-sided 5" single, a poster and a Big Black T-shirt.{{cite book |editor1-last=Bashe |editor1-first=Patricia Romanowski |editor2-last=Pareles |editor2-first=Jon |editor3-last=George-Warren |editor3-first=Holly |title=Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll: Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll |date=2001 |publisher=Touchstone |isbn=978-0-7432-0120-9 |page=72 |language=en}}

Reception

{{Music ratings

| rev1 = AllMusic

| rev1Score = {{rating|3.5|5}}{{cite web|title=allmusic ((( Pigpile > Review )))|url={{AllMusic|class=album|id=r71104|pure_url=yes}}|publisher=Allmusic|author=Raggett, Ned|accessdate=March 17, 2010}}

|rev2 = Alternative Rock

|rev2score = 6/10{{Cite web|url=http://archive.org/details/alternativerock0000thom|title=Alternative rock|first=Dave|last=Thompson|date=April 12, 2000|publisher=San Francisco : Miller Freeman Books; Berkeley, CA : Distributed to the book trade in the U.S. and Canada by Publishers Group West; Milwaukee, WI : Distributed to the music trade in the U.S. and Canada by Hal Leonard Publishing|via=Internet Archive}}

|rev3 = The Encyclopedia of Popular Music

|rev3score = {{rating|3|5}}{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_NNmFiUnSmUC&q=sound+of+impact+big+black+1987&pg=PA2601|title=The Encyclopedia of Popular Music|first=Colin|last=Larkin|date=May 27, 2011|publisher=Omnibus Press|isbn=9780857125958|via=Google Books}}

| rev4 = The Great Alternative & Indie Discography

| rev4score = 7/10{{Cite web|url=http://archive.org/details/greatalternative0000stro|title=The great alternative & indie discography|first=M. C. (Martin Charles)|last=Strong|date=April 12, 1999|publisher=Edinburgh : Canongate|via=Internet Archive}}

| rev5 = MusicHound

| rev5score = 2.5/5{{cite book|title=MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide|editor=Gary Graff|editor-link=Gary Graff|edition=2nd|year=1999|location=London|isbn=978-1-5785-9061-2|publisher=Visible Ink Press}}

| rev6 = Rolling Stone

| rev6Score = {{Rating|3.5|5}}Brackett, Nathan. "Big Black". The New Rolling Stone Album Guide. November 2004. pg. 69, cited March 17, 2010

| rev7 = Select

| rev7Score = {{rating|4|5|full=U+25A0.svg|empty=U+25A1.svg|rating=medal}}{{cite journal|title=Big Black: The Hammer Party / Atomizer / Songs About Fucking / Pigpile|journal=Select|issue=31|date=December 1992|last=Perry|first=Andrew|page=86}}

}}

Released five years after Big Black chose to disband at the peak of their artistic and commercial success, Pigpile received concurrent and retrospective reviews ranging from lukewarm to gushing. Writing shortly after the album's release, Spin magazine remarked that Pigpile was "a live album with sound quality unworthy of an audio nut like Albini."{{cite book |last1=Weisbard |first1=Eric |last2=Marks |first2=Craig |title=Spin Alternative Record Guide |date=1995 |publisher=Vintage Books |isbn=978-0-679-75574-6 |language=en}} Looking back at Albini's career through Big Black and his subsequent band, Rapeman a decade on, Rolling Stone called Pigpile a "fun-but-not-revelatory live album," ranking it a notch below any of the group's studio albums.

Track listing

  1. "Fists of Love" – 4:14
  2. "L Dopa" – 1:49
  3. "Passing Complexion" – 3:06
  4. "Dead Billy" – 5:12
  5. "Cables" – 3:18
  6. "Bad Penny" – 3:03
  7. "Pavement Saw" – 2:56
  8. "Kerosene" – 6:38
  9. "Steelworker" – 4:52
  10. "Pigeon Kill" – 2:24
  11. "Fish Fry" – 1:55
  12. "Jordan, Minnesota" – 7:05

Album credits

References

{{reflist}}

{{Big Black}}

Category:Big Black albums

Category:1992 live albums

Category:Touch and Go Records live albums

Category:Au Go Go Records live albums