Heavy Metal Detox

The title sets up a joke that the music immediately undermines — there's nothing cleansing happening here, and the detox in question feels more like trading one noise for another. The guitars arrive thick and buzzing from the first second, a wall of fuzz that owes as much to Melvins as it does to Beach Boys, the distortion so saturated it becomes its own texture rather than just an effect. The tempo has a locked-in, almost mechanical drive, the drums hitting with blunt force while the bass anchors everything in a low rumble that you feel more than hear. Williams's vocals are sardonic and slightly arch, delivered with the flat affect of someone who has run out of the energy required for full irony but hasn't quite arrived at sincerity either. There's a teenage quality to the energy — not immature, but genuinely adolescent in its refusal to take the weight of things too seriously, even when the weight is real. The song doesn't resolve so much as it exhausts itself, the noise wearing down into something that resembles relief. It captures that specific feeling of blasting music so loud that you temporarily crowd out whatever was bothering you, not solving anything but achieving a few minutes of beautiful static. Best played at high volume in a car with the windows down, going nowhere in particular.