Acid King “Beyond Vision” Review: Bay Area stoner legends go into interstellar overdrive on new psychedelic album.
At 30 years in, San Francisco’s Acid King can lay claim to being one of the original sonic architects of both doom metal and stoner rock. Vocalist/guitarist Lori S. (and her revolving lineup) has forged her own path with guttural riffs, seismic arrangements and commitment to groove.
The band, whose current lineup includes additional guitarist/keyboardist Jason Landrian, drummer Jason Willer and bassist/synth player Bryce Shelton, return with Beyond Vision (March 24, Blues Funeral), Acid King’s first album since 2015’s Middle of Nowhere, Center of Anywhere.
And more so than any album in their career, the group truly capitalize on the “Acid” in their moniker, as S. explains in a recent press release: “The band was never really that psychedelic, but this is definitely more trippy because we’ve got keyboards and synthesizers…the songs really have no beginning or ending—they all just flow into each other. It’s meant to be listened to as one piece. The whole point was to have the listener feel like they’re on a journey.” And given how each track blends into the next, each infused with the sense of cosmic atmosphere, her intentions were realized.
Part of that makes Beyond so expansive and fresh, is its creative origins, crafted during the pandemic as an experimental collaboration between S. and Landrian (Black Cobra), before becoming the next proper Acid King album, with S. telling Guitar Player : “We both were going into musical territory neither of us had been in before, and this was the biggest reflection of sounds heard on the new record.”
This is evidenced in One Light Second Away: an instrumental, drenched in eerie bass hum, and John Carpenter-esque synth drones before breaking into lumbering kick-drum and strident doom riffery, or Mind’s Eye with its churning guitar intro and S.’s ghostly wail, coalescing into a rich sonic odyssey
Beyond Vision was heavily inspired by celestial films including Stanley Kubrick’s 2001 and the 2019 documentary Apollo 19, fully infused with sci-fi vistas and interstellar atmosphere. Take 90 Seconds, which according to S. is about “how long you can last in space without oxygen.” It’s an insular rocker, recalling the rolling riff of Soundgarden’s Searching With My Good Eye Closed.
The album hits its zenith towards the tail end, when the ominous instrumental Destination Psych bleeds into the vocal title track: the two songs are companion pieces, married to the same melancholy descending melody, but the soaring anthemic chorus of the second song truly sends the album into the stratosphere, with S.’s droning vocals adding hypnotic heft.
Everything culminates with closing track Color Trails, a cinematic instrumental that starts off languid before descending into spiraling delayed guitar and thunderous tribal drumming which intensifies throughout the song. It’s the band’s homage to Space Oddity, according to S: “This is my ‘return to Earth’ song or my return home…it levels off at 35,000 feet into cruising altitude as I channel my biggest influence, David Bowie.”
In many ways, Beyond Vision feels like a game-changer for Acid King, and S. states as such in the press release: “It’s probably a direction I’ll keep going with…we’re done dabbling. We’re going for it. And I can’t see going back.”
With an album this strong, it’s hard to argue with her strategy. And even if Acid King sets controls for the sun, never to return to Earth, the group’s fanbase will happily strap themselves in to head off wherever Lori S. and co. sonically traverse across the universe.