For the last seven years, German outfit Iron & Stone have plied their trade in straightforward heavy rock vibes, touching on desert-style here and there but keeping a rougher edge to the proceedings generally that’s allowed them to maintain a distinct feel to what they do. Their upcoming four-song EP, You Can’t Stop What’s Coming, is out Sept. 27 through Hand of Doom Records and finds the band working around a conceptual narrative for the first time, taking a theme derived from the Coen Brothers film No Country for Old Men — adapted from the novel by Cormac McCarthy — to embark on a discussion of character and plot. That’s a fair amount of ground to cover in four tracks, and I think even the band would admit they’re not really delving into the full details of every twist and turn that story takes — if you’ve seen the film or read the book, you know there are a few — but as they follow-up their 2017 debut LP, Petrichor (review here), 2015’s Old Man’s Doom EP (review here) and sundry other offerings put together over the course of their early transition from working just as the duo of vocalist Hennig Lührig and multi-instrumentalist (now just guitar) Stephan Möller, Iron & Stone have arguably never sounded more like a complete band than they do here.

All told, You Can’t Stop What’s Coming — the title a particularly memorable line from the film — is about 18 minutes long, so again, it’s not like Iron & Stone are making major demands on anyone’s time. What they do instead is offer a gruff take on riffy grooves, with Lührig‘s voice adding an Acrimony-style sense of throaty melody amid the riffs from Möller and fellow guitarist Christopher Petersen and the locked-down swing of bassist Matthias Bormann and drummer Torsten Hoffmann. This Mannly rhythm section isn’t to be undervalued, as they show early in driving forward the fuzz of “Hand of Fate,” which either has an organ on it or an effect that sounds like one, or emphasizing the crunch in “Shadow on Your Neck.” And amid the touches of Truckfighters-style fuzzoleads there and in the verses of the slower “Old, Bitter and Out of Touch,” indeed the bass and drums hold the songs together on structural terms, making sure the mission is completed in the fashion it ultimately is: without pretense and with plenty of weight behind its push. As the band digs into its heaviest crunch on closer “1958,” there’s no doubting they’re all on the same page — a bit of cowbell emerges as the icing on a proverbial cake baked in classic European stoner rock.

That foundation, inherently, is familiar enough, but there’s little about You Can’t Stop What’s Coming not to dig provided one enters the fray knowing ‘what’s coming.’ One way or the other, Iron & Stone make a fervent argument for vitality in such a heavy modus, and listening to them ride out the groove of “1958” with the guitars intertwining over flowing undulations of crash, I’m not inclined to fight them on the point. Changing the world? Nope. Kicking ass and having a good time doing it? Clearly. Seems like if it’s one or the other, they’re making the right choice of where to end up in terms of ambition.

Below you’ll find the video premiere for “Shadow on Your Neck,” followed by more about the EP. I hope you enjoy:

Iron & Stone, “Shadow on Your Neck” official video premiere

Hand Of Doom Records is proud to release Iron & Stone’s new EP „You can‘t stop what‘s coming“ on September, 27th, 2019. The successor to Iron & Stone‘s 2017 album „Petrichor“ (released on Hand Of Doom mother-label Backbite Records) features 4 tracks, all of them lyrically inspired by the Coen brothers movie-adaption of Cormac McCarthy‘s novel „No country for old men“. Three of them explore certain characters of the story while „1958“ recounts a key moment of the story.

It is the first time for Iron & Stone to lyrically work with concepts of another artist. Musically the band adds a nuance of blues to the overall sound, while staying firmly rooted in the doom- and stonerrock genres, keeping the guitars fuzzy, the tuning low and the grooves heavy.

In typical Iron & Stone fashion all songs were recorded DIY at their rehearsal space near Hannover, Germany. Tracking took place from May to September 2018. The mix was done by the band as well while the mastering was done by Andreas Brunke, a close friend of the band, who mastered all earlier Iron & Stone releases so far.

The cover was drawn by tattoo-artist Mark Schankath of PMA Tattoo, Hannover.

Pre-order is live now. The orange/black, one-sided 12” vinyl (with a screen-printed b-side) is available in an edition of 300 copies and as digital download.

1. Hand Of Fate
2. Shadow On Your Neck
3. Old, Bitter & Out Of Touch
4. 1958

Iron & Stone are:
Hennig Lührig – vocals
Christopher Petersen – guitar
Stephan Möller – guitar
Matthias Bormann – bass
Torsten Hoffmann – drums

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Tags: Germany, Hand of Doom Records, Hildesheim, Iron & Stone, Iron & Stone You Can't Stop What's Coming, You Can't Stop What's Coming

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 18th, 2019 at 7:10 am and is filed under Bootleg Theater. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.