Iron Cemetery – Iron Cemetery EP Review

Who would’ve guessed that the key to making a top-shelf death/thrash record might involve fun. You remember fun—that thing that occasionally happens after getting yelled at by your boss, getting yelled at by the internet, getting yelled at by your neighbors, and getting yelled at by your spouse? We’re allowed roughly twenty minutes of fun per day, and hopefully that doesn’t begin and end with you sitting on the can and looking on your phone for rare records via discogs with your underwear around your ankles.

Iron Cemetery’s self-titled EP is very fun—like a breakneck Slip ’N Slide straight into purgatory.

Who would’ve guessed that the key to making a top-shelf death/thrash record might involve skill. You remember skill—that thing that occasionally happens after half-assing your umpteenth preferred stock report, eating your billionth bland chicken wrap, passively limping through 30 minutes of cardio, and putting together yet another shitty particle board dresser with only nine leftover hoopdenöögle bolts left on the floor. Most people showcase roughly twenty minutes of actual skill per day, and that optimistically includes “The Move” learned from an ancient Seinfeld episode and performed by you or on you.

Iron Cemetery’s self-titled EP involves great skill—tight, speedy and storming with menace.

Who would’ve guessed that the key to making a top-shelf death/thrash record might involve keeping it short, stupid. You remember keeping it short, stupid—that thing that occasionally happens after you spend 45-minutes sculpting your eyebrows or beard, endless minutes lost to grilling a server at an Italian restaurant about gluten-free options, or precious time wasted by replying to a text with correct grammar when a simple “YOLO” would have sufficed. The general population should probably spend more time keeping it short, stupid, and hopefully that goes beyond allowing your dog to covertly cut a proud turd in your neighbor’s side-lawn instead of walking allllll the way down to the sketchy dog-poop park.

Iron Cemetery’s self-titled EP keeps it short, stupid—17 brisk minutes of grisly devilry.

These guys are sneaky. They are sneaky because, 1) despite not sounding much like Ratt, they ain’t listed on Metal-Archives, 2) they employ aliases such as NIGHT, VOID and ROT, which probably looks funny at the Laser Tag arena, and 3) outside of a bandcamp page, they have zero presence on the World Wide Web. Keep it hush-hush, you sneaks. Fred and Velma will eventually crack the case, though, because they’re still meddling kids, even after 40-odd years. Never mind the truth that the (seemingly hundreds of) riffs and all the fiery lead-work smuggled into these minutes sound sneakily like something a certain former Bay Area maven might do, and that the vocals, bass and drumming sound equally as swift & polished in a particularly ghoul-ish sort of way. None of those folks are involved here, though, because their names clearly are not NIGHT, VOID and ROT. Next suspects, please.

Thankfully, the music yanked from yon Iron Cemetery is not at all sneaky. This is no-bullshit death/thrash that, outside of a 30-second intro, spends all of its time beating your face in with blast-furnace blasphemy in a similar vein as Desaster, Nifelheim, Nocturnal Graves and Razor of Occam, with an emphasis on the latter’s choice of noodling melody. It ain’t rocket science, unless rocket science happens to involve ripping like broiling fiends and barking at ol’ Jesus to “Get off your fucking cross! And do something for a change!”

Apropros: Get off your fucking couch! And buy something for a change! Like this EP. You should buy this EP. Buy it because it’s fun, proficient, to-the-point, and all the money spent on it will probably be whisked off to the mountains of Missoula, Montana atop Hellsteeds ridden by grave robbers for use in nefarious live rituals and for the express purpose of sculpting brand new hymns of diabolical desecration for a highly-anticipated debut full-length in the not-too-distant future that will surely bring an explosive and poisonous end to all humankind as we know it. BEWAAAAAARE.