Acid King – Beyond Vision

 

 

Acid King – Beyond Vision
Blues Funeral Recordings – 2023
Stoner, Psychedelic, Metal, Doom
Rated: *****

I never was a big Acid King fan. Never was. Well… Until I saw them live somewhere in the autumn of 2005 in the (no longer in existence) sweaty and smokey Batcave of 013 in Tilburg. That was the moment my incomprehension vanished, when globes of fire started to twirl in my mind, leaving trails of color encircled by rings of smoke and I saw more, the sudden realization came, I am in the music. Completely and totally in the music! And the new album Beyond Vision, has me reliving that moment as a continued awakening. Shall we compare it to the album that was released back then and why they were on tour? That induced that epiphany, that had us seeing that wild psychedelic video show and Los Natas opening up for them? Or should we not tap into the discussion between hardcore fans of either the III album or Busse Woods? Arguably their best? Their best line-up perhaps? Or should we accept the fact that Acid King, is actually a queen and that Lori S. was and is the driving force behind everything Acid King and that comparing those albums, those line-up’s feels like throwing a glass of water into the ocean. It’s of no use and whatever you try writing about it, immediately becomes lost. It might be better to just concentrate on Beyond Vision and to try and write a few words that perhaps have a tiny bit of merit. 

The album features Jason Willer on drums who you might know from bands such as Charger, Jello Biafra and Cross Stitched Eyes. Bryce Shelton takes on bass duties and synth work, and that name will ring a bell if you listen to Hollow Mirrors, Hotblack Desiato, Nik Turner and that wild High Tone Son Of a Bitch album from 2022 Live At The Hallowed Halls. Black Cobra’s Jason Landrian shares writing and production credits, as well as delivering extra guitar. It’s a sonic trip that tries to make you envision interplanetary existence as well as the fact that linear life does not exist. Your path will swerve every which way but straight. And that is exactly how the music comes across, as an extremely dense, yet meandering path through the wasteland of existence. The moments of release, when inhibitions are elegantly stripped away and euphoria is on the brink of exploding, feels as much as those tab induced experiences, where you were an intrepid inner space wanderer, as music can possibly attain. But as we mentioned, there is light and vision, but also darker recesses that are more dangerous, thanks to that dense and doom approach. And then it all ends with the track Color Trails, if there’s ever been a song in the stoner doom genre that represents that green light, that sense of hope and belief, that there can be a better future, that the journey to the unknown destination, might be fruitful, this is it. Color Trails, sounds and is, heavily inspired by many space exploration movies and ideas, and the fact that Acid King makes it sound as big as the universe and thought provoking about human inner workings, is beyond… Beyond the stars, beyond words and Beyond Vision. Many Acid King albums have felt like a small and logical step for the King, but this is a giant leap for the Queen…

(Written by JK)

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