English Rock: Iron Hero's Safe as Houses

Iron Hero’s Safe as Houses sent me backpedaling into my mind. I was searching for where I had heard the same sound. There was a lot of pedaling to do through my brain’s aural storerooms, because I was having to travel back to the 80’s and England.

“Wearing a Wire” ends, and you instantly hear the Meat is Murder guitar, so my backpedaling briefly landed on the Smiths as the aural reference point. After all, Iron Hero features a welcome sound wall of guitars—strummed and filling the gaps, picked and differentiated in tight accents akin to Johnny Marr—along with Mike Joyce drumming and Andy Rourke bass. However, that aural storeroom didn’t actually hold the sound I still could hear in Iron Hero.

I had to go searching some more until I came to the Mighty Lemon Drops. The match up comes on the beginnings of “Pilot” and “Heart of a Ghost” where Sam Gunn’s Brit-air vocals are coupled with buzz-strummed guitars. The Mighty Lemon Drops slowed down punk rock, kept the tight rockabilly touchpoints, but landed with a Britrock that was as much atmospheric as it was plain, as much hard as it was pop, as straight-forward as it was complex.

Whether properly part of Iron Hero’s collective influence or not, that’s the aural storeroom where I found the sound I was hearing on Safe as Houses. Iron Hero dusts off the Mighty Lemon Drops, layers on some shine from more orchestration and effects, and shows off a restored piece of art.

Thank you to the Iron Hero for the review copy.