Tampa trio Use & Care plays a punishing brand of instrumental rock

For those who need their instrumental music to absolutely shred, there is Use & Care .

The trio includes monsters of the Bay area rock scene—drummer Vinnie Cosentino (Palantine), guitarist Alastair St. Hill (Gentlemen, Please) and bassist Jerrad McLeod.

Together on a self-titled 2003 album , the trio pummels listeners with seven tracks of sludge-metal that could go on tour with Mastodon, Queens of the Stone Age and even Chicago’s since-disbanded Hum.

St. Hill told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay that his biggest influence for Use & Care is the late Dimebag Darrell, who played one of his last shows in Ybor City at the since-shuttered Masquerade when Damageplan came to Tampa .

“I associate all the pinch harmonic Use & Care riffs with his sound,” St. Hill said.

Kudos to Danny Piechocki—a beastly instrumentalist in his own right—for mixing this record as if it were an audition for France’s Hellfest.

“I don't know if I explicitly talked to him about it, but one album that we as a band were listening to during the recording process was Terminal by Bongripper,” St. Hill added about working with Piechocki.

Use & Care doesn’t have any shows planned at the moment, but has started to work on some new material. Subscribe to Creative Loafing newsletters.

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