Friday Full-Length: Earthless & Harsh Toke, Acid Crusher / Mount Swan Split LP
Posted in Bootleg Theater on April 7th, 2023 by JJ KoczanEarthless and Harsh Toke offered their split LP, Acid Crusher / Mount Swan (review here), through Tee Pee Records in 2016. By then, the former trio were already on their way to being legends in the live performance space, their various stage-recorded offerings — arguably highlighted by 2008’s Live at Roadburn (discussed here) but by no means limited to that — some with wider distribution, some for the merch table, and studio works like 2013’s From the Ages (review here), 2007’s Rhythms From a Cosmic Sky having propelled them to the forefront of heavy consciousness as a landmark act for their generation and an influence for others to work from. Their latest LP, Night Parade of One Hundred Demons (review here), came out last year and they’ll continue to herald it live throughout 2023.
Enter, then, Harsh Toke, who were always more toke than harsh, and whose penchant for heavy jams came through the speakers in oozing fashion on 2013’s impressive debut, Light Up and Live (discussed here), also on Tee Pee. The Earthless comparison was obvious even before the two bands teamed for Acid Crusher / Mount Swan, but guitarist Justin “Figgy” Figueroa, keyboardist/vocalist Gabe Messer, drummer Austin Ayub and bassist Richie Belton dug in deep and came out of doing so with an individual chemistry and an energy that was smoke-cloud-thick in vibe and engaging to follow on its outward course.
How the two met and how the split came about, I don’t know — bands working in a similar style in the same city, it doesn’t seem unlikely they’d run into each other sooner or later — but it tells an important part of the tale of San Diego’s heavy underground in the early- and mid-’10s. It was happening, man. There were a few years there where it seemed like every couple weeks another San Diego band was popping up — and Tee Pee fostered a lot of them, but there was even more than what they put out from bands like Joy, Sacri Monti, Harsh Toke, later Pharlee, Volcano, and many others if you want to open geography to greater SoCal — and the material coming out of that town right around 2016/2017 was largely unparalleled in the US as regards single scenes. They could do no wrong.
Sure, Portland has been a heavy hotbed now for at least the last 15 years, and the doom of the Chesapeake Watershed will outlive us all, and there’s Chicago’s post-whathaveyou, Florida’s post-Cavity sludge rock, Boston’s traditional heavy songwriting, New York trying to be all things to all people all the time, on and on, but what came up in San Diego felt big and special and fresh, and so it was. I don’t know that I’d call the scene ‘over’ now, since certainly Earthless are actively touring and releasing records and they are a guiding light for newer bands some two decades into their tenure, and Sacri Monti and Zack Oakley and El Perro (maybe?) and Birth are rolling, but the boom has abated as it inevitably would, and Acid Crusher / Mount Swan serves as not only a reminder of the vitality of spirit that was behind much of what came out of that place and in those years, but emphasizes the mentor role Earthless played in shaping the classic-heavy and boogie rock methodology that in part 
defined the boom in the first place.
As ever, the trio of bassist Mike Eginton (who also did the cover art here and for most of what they put out), drummer Mario Rubalcaba (Hot Snakes, Rocket From the Crypt, etc.) and guitarist Isaiah Mitchell (ex-Howlin’ Rain, Golden Void, collabs with Seedy Jeezus and a ton of others, touring guitarist for The Black Crowes, etc.) offer quintessential heavy exploration in “Acid Crusher,” while in more of a rarity for Earthless, their piece is actually the shorter of the two side-consumers on the release. With a mood quickly set by its initial fuzzy bassline, organ (Tim Green played on the first record, not sure if he’s doing so this time), echoing tambourine flourish and Mitchell‘s shimmering guitar over the steady groove held down by Rubalcaba and Eginton that ensues, “Acid Crusher” isn’t two minutes into its total 14:56 before Earthless have dug out a space for themselves in the pocket of a mellow swing.
Some hand percussion enters after seven minutes in, and the wah overdose past the 10-minute mark has more soul than most rock records all by itself, but “Acid Crusher” is basically set around repetitions of its central groove, a light bounce that gives the keys and guitar room to play around it. As to how much is or isn’t improvised, one never really knows with Earthless, but they manage to carve a hook out of the interplay of guitar and keys, and they roll it out casual-like to make that 15-minutes go by in a semi-conscious flash. One could hardly ask for a more appropriate setup to Harsh Toke‘s “Mount Swan,” which checks in at 19:37 and fades into its takeoff with an early sense of doom overarching in the riff, but turns quick to jazzier punch in transitioning to a verse with watery vocals from Messer that even seven years later feel like a surprise after Earthless‘ instrumental take.
They don’t last, not that it would be a problem if they did. It’s a quick few lines before Harsh Toke crash out to noise and the bass picks up the thread on a slower roll, ambient psych guitar feedback and effects swirling around it. Ayub‘s drums return sooner or later, slow taps on the ride cymbal with crash for accent, an easy fluidity that defines the instrumental remainder of the song that feels correspondingly jammed out, band-in-room, and if it wasn’t recorded live, they make it easy to believe it could’ve been.
Dual-channel guitar solos take hold as the band approach the seventh minute, and they bring it to a head gradually before slowing down again, the organic nature of how they ride the main progression all the more fluid for its shifts in tempo, a bit of shred tossed in for good measure along the way. “Mount Swan” comes apart at about 12:05 and over the remainder of the track seems to hold on by a thread — or by the bass and drums, if you prefer — but it holds on just the same until its final fade, faster here, groovier there, abidingly languid all the while in complement to “Acid Crusher” before, willing a kind of warts-and-all approach that most bands wouldn’t dare even in the context of heavy psych jamming.
Repetition again serving a key role as regards rhythm, Harsh Toke still manage a showcase of dynamic that lives up to what Earthless do on side A, which, yes, is a compliment. Their last release (to-date, because one never knows) was 2019’s Burnout (review here) split with Sacri Monti and Joy, and they toured Europe that year as well. In 2018, Harsh Toke had taken part in the ‘San Diego Takeover’ at the Roadburn Festival in the Netherlands, which was arguably a crescendo for that league of San Diego heavy outfits. Earthless by then were headliners — at that fest and elsewhere — and artists-in-residence playing multiple sets, and had signed to Nuclear Blast to release the daringly-song-based Black Heaven (review here) that same year.
This split LP — a deceptively accessible listen at 34 minutes — was old news by then, but in hindsight it casts a light on the creative blossoming that took place in San Diego around this time. That scene wasn’t and isn’t perfect, but the sense of community was real, and Acid Crusher / Mount Swan underscores this as well as the heady pleasure of losing oneself in the unfolding of these longform pieces.
Thanks for reading. As always, I hope you enjoy.
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Coming on 5AM now. I’ve been up since two. It’s been like that. The other night I rolled over at 12:30 and was awake for the duration. I stayed in bed and tried to sleep for 45 minutes or so before admitting defeat and waking up. I’ve been reliably waking up around three most nights. Alarm goes off at four. I think I made it that long once this week. To be honest, at the end of the day I’m tired no matter what I do, and if I was going to ‘catch up on sleep’ or readjust my circadian rhythm to something approaching normalcy, it would probably be a process of weeks and months more than days. Maybe I’ll get there at some point. Maybe a piano will fall on my head.
While we’re on fascinating subjects, anyone want to talk about the weather? This week was The Pecan’s spring break from pre-K, and the weather fortunately cooperated for the most part. On Tuesday we went to the Turtle Back Zoo for the first time this year — it’s a regular stop for us — and plotzed around, and it was so nice out that we hit a playground after. And yesterday was actually hot in the sun, so life-affirmingly beautiful that I broke out three Amorphis records to listen to in the car as we drove from one playground to another in the afternoon.
We’d gone for an ADOS evaluation earlier in the day, which assesses a bottom line on whether or not a given brain is on the autism spectrum. The prevailing thought is no, which I’ll take — one of my three nephews is very much ASD, limited verbal, and so on, so we’re pretty attuned to it — but I think we’re all just kind of hanging around the ADHD-with-sensory-features thing. But everyone says the kid is brilliant, and it’s kind of true, so it’s possible the situation is just a ‘gonna be a smart weirdo’ kind of thing. Fair enough, I guess.
Gender continues to be a big topic in our days, and you’ll notice a lack of he/she pronouns in the two paragraphs above. I think we’re genuinely moving from ‘he’ to ‘she’ in that regard, happening like right now, and it’s kind of incredible to see this kid coming to feel so right about a thing. I remember when The Patient Mrs. first got pregnant — oh the harrowing tale, let me not relive it though I do anyway pretty much constantly — we talked about how much we wanted a daughter. Well there you go. Again, fair enough, though one does worry about things like nazis in government and shitty kids in school and violence against trans people and so on.
But the last few weekends there’s been an Our Whole Lives class at the UU church in Morristown and that has seemed to help a lot with framing at least as far as The Pecan’s own mindset goes. Dare to say she’s a good boy or some such and you’ll be corrected, with gusto. I think we might be in dresses by the time kindergarten starts this Fall, which is only an issue because all of the handmedowns we have — and we have so, so many — are boy clothes. Fucking of course it would be a money thing. Alas, we roll with it.
As 700 or so emails have already informed me this morning, today’s Bandcamp Friday. If you’re celebrating that or whatever pagan version of Easter is cool this year, I wish you all the best. We’re having family over as we will and I feel fortunate to be able to do so even while acknowledging the inevitable fuckton of work to be done. While we’re on the subject, the next seven days are a Quarterly Review, because I’m both an idiot and way backed up on shit. I might even do another week in May, then one in early July, as there’s so much coming out to try to keep up with. I’ve got most of the rest of the year planned out in that regard. At least space blocked off for fests and QRs.
And speaking of fests, I might end up at SonicBlast this August. Keeping my fingers crossed that comes together over the next week. Would be an awesome trip to add to Freak Valley in Germany this June and Høstsabbat in Norway in October, along with Grim Reefer in Baltimore later this month, hopefully Maryland Doom Fest in June, and Desertfest New York in September. Fests are easier for me at this point than club shows. Time does weird things to you.
I’ve gone on long enough so will leave it there. No Gimme show this week, but thanks if you check out any old ones in their Vault, or hit up Obelisk merch, or make it to the end of this sentence, or just exist. Have a great and safe weekend, and don’t forget to hydrate. It’ll be summer (winter in the southern hemisphere) before you know it.
FRM.
