If you go to the STB Records Bandcamp merch page to check out the different editions of the forthcoming Orange release from Southern sludge upstarts Toke, you’ll notice it says they’re all sold out. In truth, the preorders haven’t started yet — they begin Dec. 9 — for the STB version of the Wilmington, North Carolina, trio’s second full-length, but you can pretty much take that “sold out” to the bank since that’s invariably how the limited-numbers platters will end up when all is said and done. Orange was originally issued on Jan. 1 by the band and by Emetic Records and this year has done nothing at all to slow the three-piece’s significant momentum, having found them on the road a couple times over bringing their inheritance of Weedeater‘s energy and Sourvein‘s grit to stages along the Eastern Seaboard and well beyond.

The new version of Orange comes with bonus covers of Cream and Motörhead, so all the better. Here’s a pretty picture of the Die Hard edition and the details from the PR wire:

STB Records Presents!! TOKE “Orange”

Pre-Order Starts 12noon Dec 9th EST
– STBrecords.bandcamp.com. .
Vinyl Release Info:

STB 28 – TOKE “Orange” – Repress comes with 2 new VINYL ONLY TRACKS
Sunshine of Your Love – Originally by Cream
Limb from Limb – Originally by Motorhead
Rick Contes from “Young And In The Way” did guest solos on limb from limb!

Test Pressing – 15 units – Comes hand numbered with a SUPER exclusive laser etched WOOD cover.

Die Hard -75 units – 180g vinyl – Half Transparent Orange / Half Clear – with black splatter in a heavy weight euro version jacket with two diff color foil stamping.. Comes with an exclusive TOKE “Orange” cast ring, a 4ft x 4ft TOKE “Orange” silk banner, and a TOKE “Orange” Back patch for your battle vest!

OBI Edition: – 100 units- Clear with a black center and orange splatter. Printed OBI Strip – Made to look like “Toke Brand” rolling papers. hand numbered. Jacket with – spot UV

Standard Edition – 125 units- Clear with black and orange splatter Jacket with – spot UV

Save your alarms and mark your calendars. These will go FAST!

Tracklisting:
1. Within The Sinister Void 03:58
2. Weight Of The World 03:43
3. Blackened 03:41
4. Weak Life (Feat. T-Roy of Sourvein) 03:17
5. Legalize Sin 03:53
6. Four Hours For Hours 05:05

Toke is:
Bass/Vocals – Bronco
Drums – Jeremy
Guitars – Tim

https://www.facebook.com/TokeDoom/
https://tokenc.bandcamp.com/
http://tokedoom.bigcartel.com/product/orange-cassettes
https://stbrecords.bandcamp.com/merch
http://www.stbrecords.bigcartel.com/
http://www.facebook.com/pages/STB-Records/471228012921184?

Toke, Orange (2017)

New Year, new riffs. North Carolina sludge specialists Toke could never be accused of being too obscure in their intentions, and their new album Orange (also written as a parenthetical) is no different. They sludge, sludge hard and sludge often. Big tones, big riffs, aggro stoner vibes. The new six-tracker follows a 2015 self-titled and a demo from 2014 (review here) that seems to have disappeared from the interwebs, and has been released as a limited-to-100-copies-and-already-mostly-gone cassette that will no doubt find favor with those seeking to start 2017 off with a fervent nod.

I had the pleasure of watching the Wilmington-based three-piece of bassist/vocalist Bronco, guitarist Tim and drummer Jeremy perform at last year’s Maryland Doom Fest (review here), and even in that riffiest of settings, they managed to stand out for the impact of their presentation. They’ve spent some time on the road since (they had before as well), and seem to be working on establishing momentum toward a larger underground impact. I’ve yet to hear of them doing anything up to this point that hasn’t turned heads in their direction, and seeing them live was an oh-okay-these-guys-are-for-real moment of clarity.

To listen to “Blackened” from Orange, or “Weak Life,” which brings in a guest appearance from Sourvein‘s T-Roy Medlin, I hear nothing to diminish that impression. They were pretty brief in their announcing the album’s arrival, but all the info that’s out there on the digital and cassette versions is below. Their debut is also getting a vinyl treatment from Goya‘s Opoponax Records imprint this month, so heads up on that.

Be informed:

New album is live! Go snag a digital copy then a cassette!

Limited to 100 cassettes and 70% are gone! Only 20 being sold online.

Find tracks on tokenc.bandcamp.com.

We will also email you a copy of the album within 48 hours!

Tracklisting:
1. Within The Sinister Void 03:58
2. Weight Of The World 03:43
3. Blackened 03:41
4. Weak Life (Feat. T-Roy of Sourvein) 03:17
5. Legalize Sin 03:53
6. Four Hours For Hours 05:05

Released January 1, 2017

Toke is:
Bass/Vocals – Bronco
Drums – Jeremy
Guitars – Tim

Recorded and mixed by – Rick Contes
Mastered by – Dennis Pleckham
Logo Art by – Nick Males
T-Roy of Sourvein appears courtesy of Metal Blade Records

https://www.facebook.com/TokeDoom/
https://tokenc.bandcamp.com/
http://tokedoom.bigcartel.com/product/orange-cassettes

Toke, Orange (2017)

A bit about me: While most children were out playing sports, making friends, scraping knees and engaging in the socialization now prescribed as essential for healthy personal development (whoops), I was collecting. Not surprisingly, this was a learned behavior, and one I picked up in no small part because, well, I was going to get dragged to antique stores either way, so there you go. I still collect CDs, books, and so on, but when I was a kid, it was action figures, video games, shot glasses, old lighters, pretty much anything I could hold in my oversized 10-year-old ogre paws.

My mother was a big influence on me in this way, and as a result of going from shop to shop to auction house and so on, I’ve got a pretty decent knowledge base of a whole host of random artifacts, from Stickley Furniture to Northwood glass. Hardly the most masculine of trivial pursuits for an already awkward boy child, but maybe the intent was to take traditional gender roles down a peg. Or maybe it was just, “Well, the world doesn’t have enough weirdos.” I don’t really know. When I was out this past weekend and stumbled on a couple Edison Records cylinders, I was plenty happy just to recognize what they were.

By now it’s more or less commonly accepted that Thomas Edison — inventor of the lightbulb, phonograph, etc. and hero of Fourth Grade Social Studies textbooks across his and my native New Jersey — was a prick and a thief. Bullying competitors into either leaving the East Coast, as he did with the founders of Hollywood, or putting others like Thomas Lambert out of business with a barrage of patent suits, Edison was ruthless in the tradition of any number of capitalist supervillains, the only difference was a question of scale. Where others in his era might’ve sent Pinkertons in to bust up a union, Edison seems not to have been above getting a goon squad to pound on some nerds. Probably the kind who went antiquing as kids. So it goes… allegedly.

To this day, in the dining room of mom’s place in Jersey, there resides in a china cabinet an Edison Standard Phonograph and a couple of “Gold Moulded Records” — cylinder records from around the turn of the 20th century, predating the flatter discs that would emerge as the dominant format (78s were so hip) in the 1910s. I bought the ones I saw the other day (of course) and brought them home for a bit of investigation. There are two different labels on top of the thick cardboard case around each black wax cylinder. One has had its catalog number fade away — good luck finding out what it is — and the other is written over. What was at one point “You Can’t Stop Me from Loving You” by Manuel Romain from 1909 is now labeled as “The Messenger Boy March,” which was recorded for Edison by the awesomely-monikered Imperial Marimba Band and released on Blue Amberol, which was a different production method and actually blue wax (limited numbers, dude), in 1917.

Because the record in that container is black, not blue, I think it’s probably the original and that the case was just used to store “The Messenger Boy March,” but without a working player, I don’t really have confirmation it’s that and not some other release. The outsides look good, but both of the records also have some cardboard residue on them from being in the cases for so long and at some point probably encountering some moisture, so I don’t even know if they’re playable. But screw it, they look good on top of the bookshelf in the living room.

Also in my pitiful round of Googling — being married to somebody who actually does research for a living is humbling in so many ways — I found a company called Vulcan in the UK who make new cylinders you can buy if you have an old phonograph to play them (their website is here). I’ve always thought that would be a cool idea for black metal bands with short songs who don’t find tapes “kvlt” or shitty-sounding enough. Probably won’t take off as a trend, but as someone who regularly hears about this or that “dead format,” be it cassettes, CDs or vinyl, I’d die laughing to get a single on an Edison cylinder to review. Just make sure to include a download card.

Imperial Marimba Band, “The Messenger Boy March” (1917)