"Smile" is a comically depressing return by noiseniks USA Nails

Presented via a series of self-descriptors, including “a human traffic light” and “a talking book”, the band draw this image of banality as reliant on a lack of self-worth and boredom. Set to an industrial wall of noise alike something METZ might have worked on, there is little room for any light to enter amid the cacophonous combination of distortion and self-deprecations, resulting in a disarmingly frank exposé of a large chunk of modern life.

This encompassing notion finds its peak in the chorus, which consists of a simple refrain: “And I smile”. Slightly comical in its hopelessness, it nonetheless represents nothing more than a limp coping mechanism, emphasising the reality that, yes, life can really be this shit.