Fire-Toolz

Angel Marcloid, a transgender experimental musician and mixing/mastering engineer who grew up in Baltimore and later settled in Chicago, works under many aliases, one of which is Fire-Toolz. The music issued as Fire-Toolz stands out for its intense, confrontational, and fractured quality, fusing fragments of electro-industrial, digital grindcore, black metal, new age, smooth jazz, and vaporwave. Themes center on Internet culture, sexuality, severe isolation, and spirituality. The project surfaced in 2015 and progressed through later releases such as the 2018 album Skinless X-1 and the 2023 effort I am upset because I see something that is not there., the latter marked by greater emphasis on hooks.

Marcloid began producing music in the 1990s, starting with prog and metal before fronting several emo bands. She gained recognition in the harsh noise scene under the name Pregnant Spore and numerous additional monikers while running the cassette and CD-R label Rainbow Bridge as well as the digital imprint Swamp Circle. Fire-Toolz first surfaced in late 2015 through the cassette Even the Files Won't Touch You and the digital release Further Down the Files. Drip Mental came out on Hausu Mountain in 2017, and Interbeing followed on Bedlam Tapes the same year. Skinless X-1, Fire-Toolz’s initial vinyl release, appeared on Hausu Mountain in 2018 and earned widespread critical acclaim. The label also issued Bubble Universe!, the debut album from Marcloid’s smooth jazz-influenced side project Nonlocal Forecast, in 2019, while Orange Milk Records released Fire-Toolz’s Field Whispers (Into the Crystal Palace) later that year. Marcloid additionally released the remix album Triangular Reformat, which included material from both projects. Beyond these endeavors she put out multiple vaporwave albums as MindSpring Memories and several experimental tapes as Angelwings Marmalade.

Fire-Toolz returned to Hausu Mountain in 2020 with Rainbow Bridge, an album reflecting on mortality, compassion, and grief whose title references Marcloid’s former label. The self-issued I Can't Die EP arrived in May 2021, and HausMo released the expansive Eternal Home later that year. A number of digital releases, among them a collection of Rainbow Bridge remixes, surfaced in 2022. I am upset because I see something that is not there., which features a stronger presence of clean vocals and pop-influenced hooks, appeared in 2023.