Ironboss

Ironboss Rides Again (Reptilian)
by Brian Varney

Well, well, well, Christmas comes at all times of the year. A couple weeks ago, I was playing the recent Ironboss live album (Guns Don’t Kill People… Ironboss Does!, released on Underdogma) and wishing I had a well-recorded studio album so I could really get a handle on what they sound like and, sha-zam!, this shows up in my mailbox.

Manly though it was, Guns Don’t Kill People… is just too badly recorded to really give any sort of accurate picture of the band’s sound. It’s probably a cool thing to have if you’ve actually seen the band live ’cause the sound’s all fucked up like you’re standing up front and too drunk to hear correctly, but if you’re sitting at home listening, it just kinda sounds like a plate of mud. And that’s why Rides Again is the perfect companion piece.

The other side of the Ironboss experience, Rides Again is the band captured loud and clear in an actual recording studio with actual production so you can, like, hear what’s going on. And if this CD is any indicator, what’s going on is pretty damn good.

Whatcha get is the classic early ’70s hard rock you’d expect from an album whose title is borrowed from a James Gang album, though with a strong Southern rock slant that makes me wanna throw ’em on a stage with Blackfoot, the (Columbus) Godz, or American Dog and yell “Goddamit!” all night. And the Cactus cover that ends the CD is the cherry/scoop of ice cream/icing on top – you knew it was coming, even if you didn’t know what form it’d take. In this particular case (“Rumblin’ Man,” Link Wray by way of Cactus), it’s more like a whiskey chaser followed by a fistful of buckshot to the teeth, but that’s not always a bad thing, right? I mean, sure, it’s no good if you’re set on the idea of your teeth staying rooted in your gums, but what kinda pussy worries about those things? You don’t need teeth to drink, do you?
(403 S. Broadway Baltimore, MD 21231)