The Dillinger Escape Plan released Ire Works in the United States on November 13, 2007, through Relapse Records. Their third studio album expanded the melodic experiments of Miss Machine while the band rebuilt its rhythm section. Founding drummer Chris Pennie had departed, and Gil Sharone stepped in for sessions with producer Steve Evetts.
“Milk Lizard” put a big chorus and trumpet accents inside a driving rock song. Greg Puciato’s falsetto on “Black Bubblegum” gave the record another melodic focal point, with both songs sharing space with the frantic guitar work of “Lurch” and “82588.” It was a broad brief for a new drummer.
The band had prepared for the possibility that Sharone wouldn’t be ready. Bassist Liam Wilson told Pennyblackmusic in October 2007 that most of the record had been worked out with programmed drums as a backup. Hearing Sharone’s performances allowed them to abandon that contingency. The material was extensively demoed, but the musicians hadn’t exchanged every experiment, leaving room for ideas to emerge in the studio. They also encouraged Puciato to sing and Sharone to explore. “The only deliberate vision was to avoid ever painting ourselves into a corner,” Wilson said.
Those demos grew out of a writing process that accommodated the distance between members. Guitarist Ben Weinman supplied the initial musical framework, and Wilson and Puciato developed their contributions around it. Files traveled by email, allowing everyone to arrive at rehearsals prepared and spend their time together refining the playing. Recording then brought them into much closer contact. In a May 2008 interview with The Music, Wilson recalled sharing a hotel room in California and continually discussing the material between studio sessions. The concentrated schedule let them revisit decisions the following morning, unlike the recording of Miss Machine, which had been interrupted by lengthy touring stretches.
Sharone’s contribution went beyond reproducing the demos. Wilson pointed to “Horse Hunter” as a song whose rough form had initially left him struggling to hear how it would work. Sharone’s playing helped turn it into one of his favorites. The finished track also featured Mastodon’s Brent Hinds on additional vocals, while former Dillinger singer Dimitri Minakakis returned on the opening “Fix Your Face.”
Across the album, the arrangements gave that flexibility a practical purpose. Electronic passages and manipulated rhythms became part of the writing on “Sick on Sunday” and “When Acting as a Wave.” “When Acting as a Particle” made room for strings and percussion. The closing “Mouth of Ghosts” stretched to nearly seven minutes, opening with piano and restrained, jazz-inflected drumming. Together with the shorter, more abrasive tracks, these pieces gave Sharone and Puciato very different demands to meet within the same record.
The contrasts carried into the live set. In the 2008 interview, Wilson described metal fans singing along to “Black Bubblegum” and “Milk Lizard.” He also explained that a melodic song could remain physically demanding: the continuously moving bass part in “Milk Lizard” made it the hardest song for him to play in the set.
