In his 1915 novella The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka concocted a scenario so ludicrous that his name eventually became synonymous with bizarre surrealism. Protagonist Gregor Samsa awakes one morning to find himself transformed into “a horrible vermin” with a “brown belly, slightly domed and divided by arches into stiff sections” and “many legs, pitifully thin compared with the size of the rest of him,” except one of Gregor’s greatest concerns is how he plans on getting to work in his insectile state. Because he hasn’t reported his absence, his boss shows up at his house and interrogates his family, wondering where he is. Gregor’s mother tells him that he isn’t well, but the chief clerk is callously indifferent to the mysterious illness that has confined his employee to his bedroom. “I must say that if we people in commerce ever become slightly unwell then, fortunately or unfortunately as you like, we simply have to overcome it because of business considerations,” the manager responds. On “Deep Blue,” an early highlight from Chat Pile’s third album, vocalist Raygun Busch writes about how capitalism erodes selfhood. To blend in through corporate assimilation, workers don masks, but wearing them too long means they eventually melt into your own face. The person you were pretending to be is now the person you’ve simply become. It’s a compromise that turns into a sacrifice. One day you’re a prosperous businessman, and the next you’re a large insect. Raygun directly gestures toward the Kafkaesque nature of capitalism at the end of the second verse. “Might be a bug now, but I still gotta get to work,” he mutters, his voice shaking with a mix of fear and apathy. Who Loves the Sun, like the Oklahoma City sludge metal band’s previous two records, is grotesque music for a grotesque world. Their disturbing yet transfixing songs about the climate crisis, capitalism, and the ruling class underline the fantastical qualities of American failure, the band’s tales of systematic oppression rendered as violent and upsetting as a gratuitously bloody slasher film. It’s easy to portray structural inequalities with detached, academic stoicism, but Chat Pile throws you right into the sadistic underbelly of it all. Stin’s gritty basslines, Cap’n Ron’s pulverizing drums, Luther Manhole’s punishing guitars, and Raygun’s guttural screams prevent the message from getting lost. Whether it’s the ‘90s alt-rock plucks of “Intruder,” the unsettling howls of “Christabel ‘26,” or the off-kilter syncopation of “Shrine,” the foursome’s righteous indignation takes many forms. Opening track “Creature” bulldozes the gates, as Cap’n Ron ushers in a wave of tom-heavy drum fills that set the tone for what’s to come. Stin joins him with one of the nastiest (complimentary) basslines in Chat Pile’s catalog, and Luther’s spiky, menacing guitar skulks through the mix like a Tolkien goblin. Such is the canvas for Raygun’s portents of a world wrought by preventable ecological damage: “Every city! / Underwater! / Every creature! Led to slaughter!” He shouts each word with a blood-curdling exigency, and he admonishes those in power who dismiss their role in accelerating environmental collapse. “Please don’t say we couldn’t stop this / Please don’t feed me all that bullshit,” he seethes in the bridge, his fury stinging like needles to the skin. Occasionally, Raygun directs his ire toward more specific targets, such as the mall conglomerate Simon Property Group in the disheartening blue-collar narrative “PEN I S MALL.” The story follows a dutiful worker bee named Greg who does maintenance at a mall, fills the truck with QPR, and spends his hours under a blazing sun, smashing his shins to bits. Someday, he dreams of owning a Harley, and, despite tattling on his co-worker Ray for reading a book on the clock, Raygun mentions that “Greg and Ray live under the same boot.” Capitalism may pressure you into obedience, but whether you’re an upstanding employee or reading a book on company time, the system treats you like dirt either way. Raygun draws from his own experiences as a maintenance man at an OKC shopping mall, and his visceral screams are that much more harrowing when you realize he’s probably the man who got caught reading on the job. It accentuates the brutal nightmare that is life under capitalism. You can’t even engage with literature, an edifying and fulfilling experience in and of itself, without a bootlicker chastising you. Closing track “October All the Time,” which features fellow OKC resident and Chat Pile collaborator Hayden Pedigo, initially seems like an outlier in the band’s discography. It begins as a quiet, acoustic guitar-heavy exercise in what seems like positive affirmation. “Everything will be fine / The sun will continue to shine,” Raygun sings quietly. But this is Chat Pile, and there’s an uneasy bent to the mantra, as if Raygun is trying to convince both you and himself. Luther’s guitars spark in the background like embers from a volcano on the brink of eruption. Stin’s distorted bass makes a brief appearance, like a trotting coyote that glances in your direction, making sure you’ve registered its presence before it resumes stalking its prey. By the time the final chorus hits, though, there’s a slow build-up, and Cap’n Ron leads his bandmates into a short-lived but noisy moment of catharsis, shifting from acoustic guitar-heavy to just straight-up heavy. Even in moments of purported peace, Chat Pile reminds you that we’re all just bugs under the proverbial boot, ready to be squashed at a moment’s notice. But never be complacent, the band seems to say. You might be a docile participant, a high-value producer, but, one day, you could wake up and metamorphose into vermin, and your boss wouldn’t give a shit. [The Flenser] Grant Sharples is a writer, journalist, critic, and musician. His work has also appeared in Interview Magazine, Uproxx, Pitchfork, Stereogum, The Ringer, NME, and other publications. He lives in Kansas City. You can follow him everywhere @grantsharpies.