The title track reminds me of a faster Master of Puppets, with its sharp vocals, deliberately shaky speed, ambiguous lyrics, and flawless melodic instrumental section in the middle. The Green and Black is over 8 minutes long and worth every second, the highlight being the excellent chorus and dual-lead guitar solo. ![]() Ironbound's first two tracks, The Green and Black and the title cut (the best two offerings on the album, by the way), are two thrash masterpieces that flawlessly combine thrash's crushing rhythms and tempos with much of the exhiliration full-throttle power metal can produce, when it's done right (which isn't often). From the roller-coaster ride that is The Green and Black, to the old school Bring Me The Night, to the melodic The Head and Heart, to the blistering closer that is The SRC, all that's served up on Ironbound is straight up thrash metal. There is no 'groove metal' (if there was ever any groove metal in Overkill) here. Dave Linsk, Derek Tailer, and Ron Lipnicki aren't exactly household names, but all three are extremely capable musicians who actually seem to specialize in creating barely-contained chaos with their respective instruments, which fits the music writing style of D.D. For 15 studio albums now, they've gotten by on pure energy, and it would be pretty foolish to doubt them from here on out. One major key to Overkill's success is that they've never had to rely on being sinister, evil, overly brutal, or atmospheric to be effective. Yet, they outdid both of them, and made what is very close to the best Overkill disc to date. So in thrash metal's recent comeback, with most of the original juggernauts releasing quality return-to-forms, Overkill didn't have nearly as much to prove as the Metallicas and Megadeths of the world did. They've already released two very solid thrash albums this millenium, Bloodletting and Immortalis. They did suffer a minor dip in quality in the 90's, after the release of Horrorscope, but they never made any real changes to their sound (much of their 90's material is labeled 'groove metal', but that's used incorrectly just about all the time anyway). What it is, however, is a snapshot of one of the few old-school thrash bands that has actually gotten better with time rather than collapsing under the weight of their own success/excess, giving the listener a look at one of the original heavy hitters of metal who are still at the top of their game and only getting heavier.Review Summary: The latest excellent entry in the thrash metal resurgence. To be clear, Ironbound isn’t a boldly experimental work or a masterpiece of unfiltered musical virtuosity, and a younger generation of metal fan might not be able to fully appreciate what it represents. Even after 30 years and an unfortunate stroke, Ellsworth’s voice is clear and dominant, giving him a commanding presence amongst the excellent guitar work. Another high point is Bobby “Blitz” Ellsworth’s singing. On the titular “Ironbound,” guitarists Dave Linsk and Derek Tailer deliver a massive, chugging riff that manages to be intense without ever indulging in meat-headed aggression. With a classic combination of crunchy riffage backed by a furious double-bass drum stampede, Overkill delivers straightforward metal aggression without any neo-classical or prog pretensions. While the album may not have any studio trickery or meandering prog epics, what it does deliver is a dose of old-fashioned, full-speed-ahead thrash. ![]() While modern bands have been taking metal into an increasingly esoteric direction, Ironbound shows that sometimes the old ways are the best ways. ![]() Over the course of 15 albums and a 30-year career, Overkill have proven time and time again that they’re one of the most relentlessly enduring bands in thrash metal.
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