There is something that stirs deep in the woods, and like the abyss, the longer one gazes into it, the deeper it gazes back. And what we see staring at us is often a reflection of the things we deliberately try to ignore. Tysk Tysk Task understand this emotion, and now lure us deep into a psychological terror with a warm embrace and social refection through “Toadstool,” a menacing twirl of indie grunge with a dirge-like pull from the Lowell band that celebrates its new video with a release party tonight at Lilypad in Cambridge.
“‘Toadstool’ is our most acerbic and ‘angriest’ song to date, I’d say,” vocalist and guitarist Samantha Hartsel tells Vanyaland, just as the band’s first-ever music video, shot and directed by Asher Thomas of Poltergeist Media, goes live.
The primal track was recorded as a collaboration between Tysk Tysk Task second guitarist Rick Martel (Chainlacing) and drummer Joe Milia (Burp., Mold, Quick & Dirty Records), now rounded out in the band by Keith Dusoe (Gut Health). It was mixed, mastered, and produced by Martel with engineering by Milia, and crafted between Treehaus, the band’s clandestine DIY studio in the woods of Lowell, and the Mill City DIY venue The Valley.
“The meanings behind our songs are always, at least, a little, intentionally vague,” Hartsel adds. “But this one was a special opportunity for me to try and craft a story behind the words. I am inspired by songwriters like Regina Spektor and Diane Cluck and even Lana Del Rey who weave images and metaphors through their melodic phrases.”
From there it bends and twists and aches, particularly with a sinister kind of horror that is primed in a particularly 2025 kind of way.
“It tells the story of a woman abducted after a DIY show and left for dead in the woods, with only mushrooms in the spring cropping up to show where she was left behind and maybe even forgotten,” Hartsel admits. “But for me personally, it’s a story of my frustration with the political climate and ever-evolving hellscape of ‘troubling/ bedrot-as-disassociation / maybe-coping-maybe-not’ times.”
And the reflection is one that is both universal and personal. What lurks in the woods usually has the ability to understand the fears of those who enter.
“We are ‘woodland grunge,’ as we call it, and Tysk Tysk Task has always been inspired and moved by our surroundings,” Hartsel concludes. “Here in the woods of Lowell, where we shot and wrote and crafted and recorded this song, I have noticed the environment changing, ebbing and flowing and affected by the moods and colors of aggressive climate change. I am worried — I’m sure we all are. This song throws out an homage to that (‘the sun is too hot…’), but maybe we need a little universal or even spiritual perspective (‘the stars are too far…’).”
Begin to find yours through the video below, and take the feeling it stirs with you to the show tonight.
TYSK TYSK TASK + THE GHOULS + MAKEOUT PALACE :: Friday, October 17 at Lilypad, 1353 Cambridge St. in Cambridge, MA :: 7:30 p.m., $18, all ages :: Event info :: Advance tickets
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