IRONSTONE is a progressive metal band from Bendigo, Australia. As a young band breaking into the Melbourne metal scene in 2018, it quickly became apparent that their high energy live performance and impressive musicianship was turning heads and earning them the attention of many new fans. Greatly influenced by progressive giants such as Periphery, Twelve Foot Ninja and Tesseract, their music features the brutality of screams and down-tuned percussive guitars, balanced in delicate equilibrium with melodic choruses, thought-provoking lyrics and atmospheric layers. The result is a unique, highly modern metal sound that is sophisticated and hard-hitting, while simultaneously enticing you to sing along.
Metal-Roos: Welcome to Metal-Roos, Ironstone. It’s a privilege to have you here.
Ironstone: It’s our pleasure! Thanks so much for having us!
MR: Tell us about Ironstone.
Ironstone: IRONSTONE is a 5 piece progressive metal band from Bendigo, a small regional city 150kms north of Melbourne, Australia. We’re a very young band with members ranging from 17 to 21. We have Dan on lead vocals, Aidan on rhythm guitar, Ollie on bass, Jack on drums and myself, Eddie, on lead guitar. The band has been going for quite a few years, but we now have a fairly new line-up which has been together for about a year. We’ve released two videos with Dan as frontman, ‘Bound’ and ‘Downpour’, and now Prophecy is our first EP reléase. It’s a very exciting time.
MR: Your debut EP came out on May 29, tell us about it.
Ironstone: ‘Prophecy’ is a collection of 6 tracks that show range and diversity, both musically and lyrically, within our progressive/ djent genre. The title ‘Prophecy’ refers to being a self-fulfilling prophecy and channelling the fear of what the future holds into affirmative action in the present. We can’t predict the future, but we can affect it with our actions.
MR: According to the bio, you include synth elements. That is somewhat unusual in the metal world, does the synth element make Ironstone unique?
Ironstone: I think synth is a lot more common in certain genres of metal than others. It’s very common in modern metal, prog, industrial and even metalcore. Then, of course, it’s used heavily in power metal and symphonic metal. It’s just another tool you can use to add atmosphere, convey mood and texture to the music. We love the idea of music being multi-faceted, so you don’t necessarily hear everything on the first listen. There is more to be discovered when you shift your focus deeper than just the voices or guitars. We hope that our particular combination of synth elements within our music makes us unique. It’s certainly what we’re striving for.
MR: How was the recording process of the EP?
Ironstone: We actually did all the recording ourselves with a very modest home set-up. We also self-produced, going through the arduous process of refining and perfecting the songs and their arrangements. We made some drastic decisions before we started tracking, cutting out entire sections in some songs, and adding last-minute ideas in others. Some changes were even made during the final recordings. Once we had everything recorded, we sent all the finished tracks on to Chris Themelco of Monolith Studios for mixing and mastering. We were absolutely blown away by his first mix. It was honestly SO close to what we wanted it was like he’d read our minds! We did sit in with him for a final mix which was great, being in the same room together and talking things through. We’re absolutely thrilled with the finished product. Chris really made the EP sound fantastic, and was on our wavelength all the way!
MR: Downpour and Prophecy were released worldwide digitally, how was the reaction of the fans?
Ironstone: We’ve had a great fan response to both Downpour and the Prophecy EP, plus some absolutely fantastic reviews which is humbling. It’s very quiet out there at the moment. Not a lot of music is being released because of COVID-19. It’s usually so hard to be heard as a new, emerging band, so we decided to use the difficulty of the situation and release while very few others are. Not being able to tour the release isn’t a problem for us because we’re not in a position to tour this year anyway with 4 us still being in school.
MR: Due to COVID-19 the 2020 shows were cancelled or delayed, how is Ironstone coping with the situation?
Ironstone: Like everyone else, we’re just trying to make the best of a challenging situation. We lost a few local shows, but nothing like some bands who lost a LOT of money through cancelled tours. We certainly don’t want to complain about ‘hardships’ or small sacrifices to our plans when SO many people have lost their lives and millions are struggling financially. Thankfully Australia has managed to keep the effects of Corona to a minimum, but we’re well aware of the devastating loss in other parts of the world.
MR: How did COVID-19 change Ironstone’s plans besides the show cancellations?
Ironstone: Just in obvious ways. Being unable to get together to rehearse or write. On a personal level, we’re all very close friends, so we really did miss being able to get together regularly. Thankfully the restrictions have eased a bit now, and we’re able to rehearse again. That was SO sweet after 9 weeks!
MR: Any more words to all the fans of metal?
Ironstone: Yeah… thanks so much to those who support us. That support means everything and enables us to keep doing what we love! To those who are just discovering IRONSTONE… we hope you love what you hear. We’re young and we’re new, so we appreciate you taking the time to listen.
MR: Thanks for the interview, Ironstone. It was a privilege to have you here, tell us your social media to follow your career.
Thank you so much for the interview and for helping to spread the word!
Interview Date: 2020-06-03
Interviewer: Jhossbert Gonzalez
