The seventh track is the loudest on this record and the least ambiguous. No doubts, no questions. Anger.
And it contains a gesture that has already appeared once here — except that the first time it meant the opposite.
The Same Gesture as in Track One
The second line: “My demons unseen, but I’m calling their name.”
The record began with exactly that. “Pain, don’t hold me tight.” “Fear, don’t still my will.” Pain and fear called by name and asked to let go. Six such appeals in the first track.
Here, naming serves something else. Not to ask a thing for anything, but to call it out into the open. The same move, the opposite intent — and that is the measure of the distance between track one and track seven.
The Scream Written Into the Lyric
The second verse opens: “The ghosts in my head scream, but I scream back louder.”
Screaming had already reached the words before this — track five has “The silence is gone, replaced by my roar.” But that one went out into nothing. Here, for the first time, it is a reply: something else is screaming, so he screams louder.
The aim is not to make the ghosts go quiet. The aim is to be louder. That is a far more modest goal, which is why it can be met.
Anger as a Tool, Not a Flaw
Three times in this lyric anger is given the grammar of an object. “This rage is my shield.” “This rage is my power.” And, to complete the set: “My will is my blade.”
A shield, a power, a blade. Objects, all of them, and not a word about how he feels. Anger is handled here as a thing you pick up, not a state you have to account for.
For somebody who has come through four tracks of helplessness, that is a real change. Helplessness has nothing to pick up. Anger does.
What This Track Does Not Do
It names no culprit. The demons are “unseen” in the title itself and never once get a description — what they are, where they came from, whose face they wear.
Across this entire record there is not a single “she,” “we” or “you.” Nine tracks, one head, nobody else. The two previous albums each had two voices; this one does not even have a second person to address.
So the anger never hits anyone. There is nobody to hit. All the force of this track goes into something that will never stand opposite you and cannot be beaten once and for all.
You can hear the track on Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube Music.
In the next post I will write about “Beacon of Resolve” — the track where the grammar changes.
Thank you for being here.
Adam Smentoch Creator of the Dust Anthem project
