Guerilla Toss. Photo by Ebru Yildiz
Singer and lyricist Kassie Carlson said her band’s sound is an ever-changing landscape of art rock music and dancy punk. “It’s fun with tons of ear worms.”
She’s entirely right.
When I first heard the name Guerilla Toss, I thought it could be a carnival game, maybe in Old Orchard Beach. Get three gorillas in a barrel and win a prize. I’ve got an accurate arm, I’m into it!
But it’s actually a band originally out of Boston and currently based in upstate New York.
They’ve been at it since 2012, and although I’m annoyed at not knowing about them sooner, I’m all-in with the latest album, “Famously Alive,” released last year.
“Cannibal Capital,” the opening track, is an explosive banger with a melange of pulsating sounds for a full minute before the vocals come in and guitars start thrashing about while a repeating beat pulls listeners further into the abyss. There’s a hectic energy to the track that makes it come all the more alive.
Lyrics include these lines:
Drained my economy of empathy, ecstasy
I’m social with enemies and it takes the best of me
Tangible fanatic, my energy memory
That cannibal capital makes everything sensory
The title track continues along this magnetic trajectory, as does the entire album. With huge swells of aural waves (“Live Exponential”) and a sometimes playful get-out-here-and-dance vibe (“Mermaid Airplane”), “Famously Alive” never lets up. All 10 tracks are stand-alone tapestries, and the closing track, “Heathen In Me,” shines with the same ferocity and sense of experimentation that runs throughout the album.
The band is Carlson, multi-instrumentalist Peter Negroponte, guitarist Arian Shafiee, Katie McShane on keys and bassist Zach Lewellyn.
After learning that “Famously Alive” was written and recorded during the COVID-19 lockdown and that Carlson recovered from opiate addiction not long before that, I hopped on the phone with her to talk things over.
Spoiler alert, there’s no wild story about the band name, they just sort of randomly came up with it. But it works, so that’s that.
Carlson recovered from her addiction about five years ago and describes her dependence on opiates concisely: “It’s horrible. It’s kind of like killing yourself really slowly.”
Though the recovery was hard, Carlson is thankful for its gifts of insight. “It gave me a new outlook on how to live and a new sight on things that I thought were beautiful and embracing that instead of pretending to be something I’m not.” Self-acceptance and being 100% are now essential to Carlson.
Carlson also said that going through recovery prepared her for the pandemic because she already knew what extreme isolation feels like.
“In addiction you’re like, ‘Nobody ever feels this way, and there’s something definitely wrong me,’ ” she said. This knowledge made Carlson understand that many experience depression and anxiety, and it made her realize that music was her way of releasing what she called “dark, heavy feelings.” The connection with the crowd Carlson feels during Guerilla Toss shows is huge. “The live sets are very danceable and exciting and fun, and it’s all about just getting sweaty together and not thinking about anything other than music and being alive.”
I also asked Carlson what it was like being signed to the Sub Pop label for the “Famously Alive” album. I mean, this is the label that signed bands like Soundgarden and Nirvana, for Pete’s sake. Carlson explained that they got the offer, then it was rescinded when the pandemic hit, then re-offered a few weeks later. The timing was sublime as she, Negroponte and Shafiee rode out the pandemic at Carlson’s Catskills home and now had a specific project to work on. It did come with a cost because many people the bandmates knew were struggling. “We felt guilty about being excited that we had something to do during the pandemic,” said Carlson.
Carlson’s been singing since she was 4 years old. Her pre-teen years were spent listening to Britney Spears and boy bands, but as she got older, Carlson found her way into punk, thanks in part to her brother who was in the thrash metal band Only Living Witness.
In addition to Guerilla Toss, Carlson also hosts a weekly radio show called Rare Pear Radio on WFFF 90.5 FM Radio Catskill.
Guerilla Toss with Lannah and An Anderson
8 p.m. Friday. Space, 538 Congress St., Portland, $15 in advance, $18 day of show. space538.org
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