For the past several years, Ian Shelton has been informing listeners through extreme hardcore on the modern day incarceration system with his pre-Militarie Gun band Regional Justice Center. He would know this better than most given that his brother, Max Hellesto, found his way behind prison walls under legally blurry circumstances, and prompted the formation of the band.

To Shelton, it’s been more than just a means in outlet and education, however. It’s been a way for he and Hellesto to connect through the bars across various demos, singles, and two LPs in 2020’s self-titled debut and 2021’s Crime and Punishment that feature scatters of the brothers’ dialogues through voice memos engulfed in blistering rage. Hellesto has now served his time, though remains entwined in systematic red tape. RJC’s third chapter makes for a fitting point o bring him formally into the flesh with the band — now rounded out by Shelton, bassist Alex Haller, and Twitching Tongues guitarist and heavy music studio guru Taylor Young — to put his scream behind the experience.

It’s oft a challenge to describe extreme hardcore music beyond its fastcore speed and power violence intensity, yet FREEDOM SWEET FREEDOM forces your ear closer to hear Shelton’s emotions from looking on the outside in as well as Hellesto’s reckoning not only with what he saw and felt during his time in lockup, but the fallout on his future as someone cursed with a permanent criminal record behind their name, to be deemed a pariah by anyone with a closed mind, and is now rewired with perpetual anxiety in wondering if they may ever lead a “normal” life again.

Most of us will hopefully never understand such a fate, but it’s important to approach an album like FREEDOM SWEET FREEDOM as an opportunity to feel a fraction of what it truly is like to be a product of the American prison system. The rage custom created for maximum pit potential is secondary to the way it will leave you asking yourself if the debt paid to society truly ever does go away.

Highlights: “MORAL DEATH SENTENCE”, “COMFORT OF ADDICTION”, “REWIRE”

Regional Justice Center’s FREEDOM SWEET FREEDOM is available now on Closed Casket Activities.

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