"With 'Toil & Folly,' STYMiE injected more than necessary energy and complexity into the post-grunge/punk rock sound, something that most bands lacked during the nineties. While most bands relied upon mid to half-time, nearly psychedelic, hard rock-inspired songs, STYMiE nurtured quite an characteristic sound that sounds fresh and unique even today, three decades after the group recorded their unreleased material." -- Thoughts Words Action
Seattle, WA early 90s band Stymie are streaming their previously unreleased (for nearly 30 years) debut full length Toil & Folly today alongside a fun and in-depth interview via Psychedelic Baby Magazine. Read the interview, see multiple 90s-era fliers and hear/share the entire Toil & Folly album HERE (Direct Bandcamp.)
Does anyone really need a primer on the Seattle scene at this point? Once-sleepy backwater, best known as the birthplace of Hendrix and Heart, goes supernova in the early ‘90s, dethroning the King of Pop and giving a handful of longhairs the chance to seriously upgrade the thread count on their flannel outerwear. But for every Nirvana, every Pearl Jam, every Soundgarden and Alice in Chains — hell, for every Tad and Supersuckers — there were countless scene staples that didn’t hit the gold-rush jackpot.
Enter Stymie. This heavy, hook-minded sextet (sometimes comprising three guitars and one bass, sometimes two guitars and two basses) was ubiquitous on bills from ’92-’94. And they were one of the only acts — likely the only one — at home sharing stages with bands as sonically wide-ranging as Buffalo Tom, Sleep, Everclear, Gruntruck, Flop, Treepeople and even the Spaceman himself, Ace Frehley.
Stymie’s own diverse musical influences — Black Sabbath, Black Flag and Black Francis are all reasonable reference points — allowed them to slot into a variety of bills but made them hard for label suitors to pigeonhole. There were flirtations, but no one put a ring on it, with the band self-releasing a handful of singles and showing up on the occasional compilation, including C/Z’s Teriyaki Asthma Volume IX. Stymie’s brief three-year run ended in late ’94 without acrimony or messy interventions, leaving behind a solid resume and a cache of unreleased material.
Toil & Folly
Now, nearly 30 years after the band’s conscious uncoupling, those tunes are ready to have the basement dust blown off them. The 13 tracks on Toil & Folly were drawn from five sessions and represent the many ways the band could bring the heavy. Largely recorded and mixed by noted Seattle producer Phil Ek (Built to Spill, Truly, Big Business), Toil & Folly is an unearthed gem for flannel-flying Seattle Sound obsessives always digging through crates (or Spotify) for that band they never heard of but can’t wait to tell everyone they discovered.
Toil & Folly will be available on limited edition LP and download on December 15th, 2023 via New Rage Records. Orders are available HERE.
Discography
• V/A Things That Are Heavy compilation 7" (New Rage) 1992
• V/A Choice Bovine Cuts compilation CD (Choice Bovine Cuts) 1992
• Grocery Bag 7" 3-song EP (New Rage) 1993
• Stymie/Lab Rat split 7" (New Rage/Apraxia) 1993
• Stymie/Control Freak split 7" (New Rage/Cavity Search) 1994
• V/A Teriyaki Asthma IX compilation 7" (C/Z) 1994
• Debut Posthumous 7" (New Rage) 1995
Patrick Barber: bass, vocals • Shane Bastian: vocals • James Halada: drums
Jeff Kleinsmith: guitar, vocals • Brian Taylor: bass, guitar • Adem Tepedelen: guitar
Artist: Stymie
Album: Toil & Folly
Record Label: New Rage Records
Release Date: December 15, 2023
01. Creepy Boss
02. Arbor Day
03. Faulty Design
04. France
05. One Proud Stout
06. Sour Apples
07. Punch & Judy
08. True Thrill
09. Willy’s Gone
10. Squalor
11. Toil & Folly
12. Girl
13. Frogs
On The Web:
discogs.com/label/150910-New-Rage-Records
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