My house is a split-level, and whenever I pass by the main level I have a routine. First I tap two fingers on the front door lock, then two fingers on the window latch, then two fingers on the sliding glass door, then two fingers on the fridge and freezer doors. I am always very careful not to tap them too hard, otherwise I might have opened them a crack and I have to do the whole process again. I might do this 3 to 5 times every time I pass by this part of my house and sometimes as many as 50 times in a day (on particularly anxious ones).

I’m not sure why-most of the things I am afraid of can’t be stopped by locked doors (and I’m definitely not afraid of anyone coming through the refrigerator). I suppose what I’m afraid of is that one of these doors or windows will somehow open and all our cool air will pour out. This will tax our AC unit excessively, wasting enormous amounts of energy. Back in 2007, when I was doing scaffolding during the summer, they sent us to the power plant in Alta Vista (actually, it was more like I was kidnapped, but that’s a story for another day) and I saw mountains of wood chips that were waiting to be burned for electricity. It terrified me to see how our power was created. So I imagine being responsible for the deaths of thousands of trees, then the AC unit will die, and we will be financially strapped to replace it, and the old one ends up in a landfill, where it takes up space and leaks toxic chemicals into the soil, etc, etc…Naturally, if left unchecked, my imagination eventually blames me for the destruction of the earth, all because the freezer or sliding door was left open.

Of course this is ridiculous, but it doesn’t feel like it when you’re in the middle of a thousand terrible thoughts that come out of your mind faster than you can reason with them. Like a spray of bullets. This routine is merely a physical manifestation of what my mind sometimes does all day long, traveling in endless circles, perseverating on all kinds of things. I’ve been trying to get better, trying to force myself to pass by without tapping every lock and door, trying to let an irrational anxious thought go by without dwelling on it. It’s a work in progress.

This song is a hammer that smashes through the logical fallacies of anxiety. The guitar tones have a certain weight, a gravity, that pulls you back to earth and grounds you in reality.

I think the chorus riff is heavy, but grooves hard and feels kind of playful, like it finds the humor in this often ridiculous line of thought I described. And the verses…those are not so playful, though that riff is incredibly fun to play. I love the timbre of the down-picked, palm-muted guitars and the way the riff builds, the sense of urgency. So much of metal is about timbre, really, and there are whole worlds to explore there. Crafting a good tone is an art in itself, and it’s very personal as you can create a sound that is truly your own. The melody was the last thing to come together here and it was also kind of challenging to write a phrase that fit smoothly over the 9-beat pattern. This is one of the simplest songs on here, but sometimes things should be simple.