Chat Pile - Who Loves The Sun
2026 • THE FLENSER • NOISE ROCK / SLUDGE METAL / ALTERNATIVE
90/100
Chat Pile is back and angrier than ever on their new album, Who Loves the Sun. Their 2025 collaboration with Hayden Pedigo, In the Earth Again, showed a softer and more pensive side of the Oklahoma four piece and while this does feel like a return to more familiar raw, aggressive territory, it also shows Chat Pile has found room to grow.
The opening track, “Creature,” sets the stage for the record, invoking memento mori imagery of speaking to skulls while reflecting on a world that’s been left to rot by our corporate overlords. Vocalist Ray B. (aka Raygun Busch) said "This record focuses on my grievances with the modern world," and with lyrics like “Please don’t say we couldn’t stop this / Please don’t feed me all that bullshit / Cause this is what you always wanted / An empty world, vast and haunted” no one will accuse him of mincing words.
When the first single “Deep Blue” dropped back in June, the group’s bassist Stin said that it was actually the first song they had written for the new album, musing that “it sounds like Chat Pile doing a Billy Squire song.” It’s certainly not radio rock, but there is an undeniable catchiness to it. Plus, there’s an unsettling fever dream of a video to go with it.
Taking it back down a notch and getting serious, “Same Rules” delivers a smoldering intensity with a grumbling bassline and melancholic guitar playing over an eerie lo-fi track. This departure from Chat Pile’s signature in-your-face intensity feels like sonic evolution, perhaps lasting influence from their collaboration with Hayden Pedigo. Music video fans rejoice, for this song also comes with a macabre parody of the trailer for the upcoming film Digger.
Ah, yes. A song called “PEN I S MALL” with lyrics about a character named Greg who doesn’t drink water because he’s a man and dreams of owning a Harley. Now this is the Chat Pile we know and love. There’s something about this sort of satirical, tongue-in-cheek jam delivered with raw power that feels like it would make the ghost of Every Time I Die proud. The repetition of “Simon says” screamed throughout the chorus makes clear the frustrations with a world where we’re made to feel powerless, caught between the gears of the machines.
On “Intruder” Ray B. takes a different approach to expressing displeasure with the inequities of the world using some light roleplay. Think Parasite but with a Texas Chainsaw Massacre aesthetic. Told from the perspective of the intruder, the lyrics convey the maddening sense of injustice that’s driven this person to desperation. The chorus: “Dreaming ‘bout a life that’s fair and true / Cause there’s no difference between me and you / Except all of the pleasant sights you see / Of which the piper also promised me” captures the disdain for misfortune and the bitterness one might feel when looking at the disparities between the haves and have-nots. Guest vocals from Nightosphere singers Claire Hannah and Brittany Sawtelle add more than harmonies, adding a sort of longing and depth to the lyrics.
For those unfamiliar with the 1816 unfinished poem Christabel by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the basic gist is that a young woman (Christabel) meets a mysterious stranger in the woods and, despite several ominous warnings, invites them into her home, realizing too late that this stranger is bad news. The stranger also fools Christabel’s father who tells Christabel she’s being a buzzkill. Given the established themes of the album, it feels safe to say that “Christabel ‘26” is insinuating that we ignored the omens, let the danger in, and now we’re paying the price.
Although “Christabel ‘26” is imbued with a sense of betrayal and rage that comes through in sludgy, yet dramatic soundscapes and growling vocals that at times feel more like they’re spit in defiance rather than than sung, “Influence” feels like it’s where the climax happens. It’s one of the more up-tempo songs on the album, with toe-tapping riffs and an undulating bassline that make it feel much shorter than its four and a half minutes.
The last two songs on the album, “Family Funeral” and “October All the Time,” don’t really sound anything alike, but it feels like they work together to bring the album to a close. For one thing, they’re both emotional and vulnerable in their own ways. Hayden Pedigo makes a guest appearance, bringing with him some spooky guitar riffs that sound a bit like a haunted circus.
In an uncharacteristically soft finish, “October All the Time” comes in with acoustic guitar on the heels of the previous track’s abrupt, screaming end. The opening lines “Everything will be fine / The sun will continue to shine” are sung with tenderness over guitars reminiscent of early 2000’s alt rock. And honestly? It works really well. The thunderous crash of heavy guitars comes in for just a moment before the acoustic guitars return for the outro with the somberly-sung “October all the time.”
Who Loves the Sun shows that Chat Pile has not only the want, but the ability to grow and evolve their sound. In spite of the gravity of the lyrical content and themes, it’s clear that these guys know how to have a good time making a record. Where they’ve used raw passion and aggression on their previous albums, this LP feels more mature in many ways, with an added complexity and nuance to their approach both musically and lyrically, as well as the not-so-secret ingredient: love. They could simply melt faces with soul-rattling riffs and gutturally-screamed vocals and it would undoubtedly be a great time, but it’s clear that they want to offer more with their music.
NBA COMP: STEVEN ADAMS
Once you get past the hard, intense exterior (and the ability to set the hardest screens in the league), there really is such an empathetic, kind spirit inside of there. Don’t cross the line, the bad guy will come out.
Plus, Oklahoma City represent.