The Iron Roses Write An Album of Fight Songs For The Warrior In Us all
The Iron Roses performing in Detroit with Bad Cop Bad Cop. photo by kim moenich
I’m an old punk, meaning I know all the words to Social D’s first album, and I can tell you where I saw Fugazi and GBH the first time. All that is to say that I’m pretty curmudgeonly in my ways, and it’s rare that I seek out new bands to listen to. So it always comes as a welcome surprise when I come across a kickass new-to-me group, and it usually only happens when they are opening for another band I know and love. This is how I stumbled upon The Iron Roses. They were out on tour last year with another fairly new-to-me band, Bad Cop Bad Cop (whom I found when they were out on tour with NOFX- see how this works?!). I had quickly fallen in love with BCBC, so I decided to add them to a mini-Midwest music tour I was undertaking, picking their gig in Hamtramck, MI, as my tour stop. Lucky for me, The Iron Roses were on tour with BCBC, and my world was about to be forever changed!
Nat taking us to school. photo by kim moenich
Fast forward to now, and The Iron Roses just wrapped up a European tour with my faves, Strike Anywhere, and they have a ton of shows planned for the rest of the year. In the midst of all that, they are about to drop one helluva new album. One of the best perks of this gig is getting to preview albums from bands I absolutely love, so when The Iron Roses co-frontwoman, Natasha Gray, reached out to me to ask if I wanted to write about “Molotov Nights," the answer was a resounding “YESSSSSS”!!!
YAAAAAS Queen! photo by kim moenich
From the first chord, this album smacks you in the face with anti-fascist anthems that are going to have you throwing your fists into the air.
“A is for the apple that’s rotten to the core/ C is for the criminals who're working on the force/ A again because we all know the cycle never stops/ B is for the bastard who wants to be a cop."
This excerpt from the album’s third song, “Fascist Lullabies," had me quickly screaming along and dancing around my room. Each of the ten tracks plays out a similar theme, decrying the current state of American politics, from capitalist greed to feminist politics; this is a monument for all the battles we are raging against right now.
photo by kim moenich
I was fortunate enough to sit down with Natasha Gray and Becky Fontaine, the powerful voices of The Iron Roses, for one of the most meaningful, inspiring, and just plain fun chats I’ve had in quite a while. We talked about where they are in their lives, careers, and personal journeys and what it means to write protest anthems at this moment in time. We talked about where they all were when the idea of The Iron Roses began to form, how it came about, and where it’s going. They took me through the metamorphosis of starting a really rad punk band with a message to where they have gone with this second album and what that means for their future. And we talked about what it means to exist as women and LGBTQIA+ humans in a scene and a country that are not necessarily always very welcoming of our existence.
They bring their whole heart to the show. photo by kim moenich
The band started in the fall of 2022 when Boy Sets Fire was on hiatus and Nat was doing some solo stuff, but she wasn’t feeling really great about it. She had been working with Becky on some songs at the time, and they realized they worked really well together, and the idea for the band was born. They had both worked with Pedro Aida when they were in other bands, so when they started thinking about who they might ask to join them, they instantly thought of Pedro and realized he was “their person." Helen, the lead singer of my new favorite band, One Fall, suggested Devon Hunt to round out the quartet, and Nat and Becky thought to themselves, “How were we ever a band without these two?!”
Fast forward to now, and the quartet is putting out their second full-length album, which will hit the airwaves at the beginning of August. While the band loved what they had created thus far, both Nat and Becky felt there was an “oomph” missing from their music, a hardness that all four of them felt they wanted to add to their sound. They wanted this new direction to still sound like what the Rosebuds (a nickname their Discord fans had given themselves) had come to know and love of the band, but they wanted to blend in the hardcore background most of the members have into their new sound. Nat brought up the term “celebratory escapism," stating The Iron Roses want to create a “party onstage while still acknowledging what is going on” in the country and the world around us.
Singing our hearts out with The Iron Roses. photo by kim moenich
Having listened to the new album, I can agree that it is a great deal harder than their previous work, while still maintaining their signature sound. You can dance around your room, screaming the lyrics, but you can also mosh to it.
Bring it, Becky. photo by kim moenich
2026 is set to be the year of The Iron Roses. With the new songs on the horizon, they are set to tour all over the country and the world over the next few months, playing shows and festivals with bands who share their beliefs and support what they do, like their upcoming tour with SUBHUMANS and their spot on Frank Turner’s Lost Evenings. I expressed my hesitancy about traveling to a state like Texas, where the politics are so out of line with what we believe in, and Natasha and Becky said I wasn’t the first to say something. But the band feels it is their mission to meet people where they are, especially in an economy where travel is less and less affordable. “This is like a ministry thing to me,” Nat said. “Yeah, you have to go to those places to help people heal,” Becky added. "We have to be everywhere for everyone as a band. It feels important to be in places like Texas. It is important to be there for people who need us, like queer kids, women, and trans folk. They can see themselves on the stage and maybe they can be less afraid.”
The Iron Roses. photo by kim moenich
We talked at length about the state of punk and hardcore today and how it is very telling that some bands are screaming at the top of their lungs about the injustices we’re facing, while others, especially veterans of the scene, are suddenly quite quiet. Nat and Becky said they want to use the new album to challenge other bands to “shake it up" and to speak out because “there are great albums coming out, but there are also necessary and important albums, and that’s what we hope this album is to people. This is exactly what we think is needed right now, and hopefully people will like it.” Well, I am a person, and I am here to say that The Iron Roses absolutely have made the album we need right now, and I will be playing it on repeat for a long time to come. Stay tuned to their socials for the new single, dropping May 7th, and more to come on the new album and tours. Make sure to catch them when they come your way
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