Iron Age, The Sleeping Eye

Hailing from the hipster central town of Austin, Iron Age offers their latest, The Sleeping Eye, for all to enjoy. Hopefully.

When you see any album from Tee Pee Records, there’s a good chance that it should come equipped with rolling papers. While there are snippets of traditional stoner rock on here, Iron Age offers up a sound that is more in line with a poor man’s High on Fire or a less polished Mastodon. “Dispossessed” offers an old-school feel that rides the line between homage and parody, which may be due to the fact that the band has somewhat of a crossover hardcore background. This becomes quite obvious when listening to “Burden of Empire,” as it echoes the legendary D.R.I.

The Sleeping Eye maintains that feel for the rest of the album, mainly due to its very repetitive, chugging guitars and screaming vocals that sound like they are struggling more than singing. The stoner does show its head, though, on album closer “The Way is Narrow” — the 11-minute track features guitars slower than molasses in Alaska infused with leaves of aggression.

The album has some enjoyable parts, but after two or three tracks, you feel like you’ve heard it before. Probably because you have.