Pig Pen

The plan was to start a band that was all longtime friends.

The idea was to embrace the scene they grew up in.

The conspirators are as follows: Matty Matheson (singer), who grew up in the Niagara hardcore scene (with his late 90's band, Hanging Hearts), and who has gone on to become a chef and restaurateur. Wade MacNeil (guitarist), an active member of Alexisonfire and Dooms Children. The Romano brothers, Daniel (guitarist) and Ian( drummer), rock’n’roll veterans from Daniel Romano’s Outfit and Tommy Major (bassist) of Young Guv - @Tommy and the Commies - Daniel Romano’s Outfit

“It was during the pandemic and we were all back home,” says Matheson. The conversations began - to make something heavy, noisy and touched on the classic 80’s hardcore we all love so much. Everyone showed up with a bunch of riffs, scraps of lyrics, talked influences and principles, bounced ideas back and forth, then got chinese food. “We wrote 10 songs in one day,” says Matheson, “and the next day we recorded them.”

“Our love of each other is what makes it”, says Matheson. “Joyousness,” concurs Dan Romano. Friends having fun. “There’s a sense of community in that hardcore scene we came up in,” says Romano, “and those early enlightenments, they stay with you.” And though everyone in the band has branched out since those days, “hardcore is always the same in some ways,” Matheson says, “this is a scene of of giving, of sharing, of going the fuck off. That’s it, really.” That’s Pig Pen.