Ironbound

Overkill enter a new decade after 3 decades of being arguably the most consistent and most respectable thrash metal band. Overkill have pretty much stayed the same through their career, This being no different. Ironbound is more of the same, Just a little inconsistent but still pretty solid release.

To be honest, I think this is a step-down from their previous release "Immortalis", There seems to be a lot of filler on this one, Bobby's vocals are still going pretty strong but they can't seem to hit the heights of his performances on albums such as "horrorscope". Some of the songs on this album feel a little too long, That wouldn't be such a problem if there was some good song-writing here but sadly they only occur in short spurts. The guitar duo are still as sharp as ever and deliver many crunching groove inspired thrash riffs which will please any kill fan who likes the previous 3 albums. The drums feel very "light" again, There is no shortage of technical/fast drumming but they just don't deliver the impact as in "bloodletting".

There are many songs on this one which just go in through one ear and go out the other. Making you wonder what the song is about, The themes and the lyrics aren't very clear. One other problem i have personally, is the ordering of the tracks, I'm not convinced by the starting track which clocks in at over 8 minutes long. There seems to plenty of re-hashed material which feels like they've been recycled from old overkill and exodus albums. There is still some fantastic solo-ing to be found on tracks like 'The green and black' and 'Give a little'.

My favorite track on this album is 'Give a little' which has a really catchy and addictive chorus featuring 'group-shoutings'. The riffs of this album can't help but give you the feeling "Where did i hear something like this before?". The production is pretty good, The bass is clearly audible, as in most kill albums. 'endless war' is pretty good, The track just about saves the whole album from going stale at the right time. This still features more 'talking' and less 'singing' like their previous 3 albums.

Ironbound is a good album, The biggest problem being the track ordering and the length of few of these songs. There is a lot of filler material on some of the tracks, Which aren't bad just a little annoying. This is a good move into the new decade for the old thrash-gods. You could do much worse than buy this album. Get this if you're a die-hard overkill fan as I'm pretty sure this is exactly what over-kill fans want or if you're looking for an album to kick-start 2010.