One of the biggest names in modern noise rock, Oklahoma City quartet Chat Pile’s fourth full album, Who Loves The Sun, lives up to their much deserved hype. Heavier, more miserable and far more diverse, Chat Pile truly earn their place at the top of the noise food chain.
From grabbing the attention of the entire alternative underground on their debut album, God’s Country, back in 2022, and consistently touring the world and collaborating with psychedelic country guitar virtuoso Hayden Pedigo, Chat Pile have had an incredibly busy few years. Now, on their latest record, Who Loves The Sun, the four-piece led by vocalist Raygun Busch dive deeper into their bleak and crushingly brutal sound with heavier production and more variety than ever.
Opening track ‘Creature’ has everything Chat Pile’s dedicated fanbase have come to expect from the band wrapped up in a concise and dynamic package. From the first verse, which features booming drums and deep, distorted bass backing a clean guitar that stabs through the mix like a needle, and Busch’s agonised crooning to the song’s sludgy, screeching breakdown, ‘Creature’ is a cacophony of horrible noise that wards off all but the most curious heavy music fans. While not as immediately brutal as much of their previous work, ‘Creature’ covers all the disgusting and desolate territory that Chat Pile call their home in just under four and a half minutes.
Despite sounding more diverse than ever with several cleaner and more melancholy moments, Who Loves The Sun still has plenty of that signature Chat Pile fury. ‘PEN IS MALL’, with its stomping riff and throat-shredding vocals decrying modern workplace culture, and ‘Christabel ’26’, with its slow build into disturbing, heart-wrenching sludge territory, might be two of the heaviest tracks that the quartet have ever put out.
“Despite sounding more diverse than ever with several cleaner and more melancholy moments, Who Loves The Sun still has plenty of that signature Chat Pile fury.”
While Who Loves The Sun is guaranteed to please existing Chat Pile fans; this album isn’t simply a rehash of their previous work, bringing plenty of new sounds into the fold. Tracks like ‘Same Rules’, with its trip-hop style tape loop backing mournful clean vocals; ‘Intruder’, with erratic math-rock inspired clean guitar lines and haunting backing vocals from Claire Hannah and Brittany Sawtelle of Nightosphere or the album’s penultimate track, ‘Family Funeral’, which features some expressive and dizzying guitar embellishments from Hayden Pedigo. At its roots, Who Loves The Sun is pure Chat Pile with the same intensity and misery that have pushed them to the top of the noise rock ladder but these small details really elevate the record beyond a repeat of their earlier releases.
Who Loves The Sun shines brightly as the most varied, complex record Chat Pile has released to date. Refusing to rely on old tricks to get them by, the Oklahoma four-piece expand their horizons into various clashing genres without losing their mournful and brutal noise rock heart.