Middle-aged teenager and rough diamond Steve Turner plays part-time rock and roll and dreams of the success that he knows has passed him by. He has found love at last, so perhaps it is time to give up. Then a scrap of yellowing paper covered in handwritten guitar chords comes into his possession and he finds himself increasingly obsessed with untangling the music—obsessed, that is, to the point of neglecting himself, his friends, and Lydia Walker, the woman he loves. The Song is deep and complex and when mastered unleashes forces that he cannot control: violent, vicious forces that boil up from Hell itself to reap a bloody harvest of flesh and souls. The darkness infects everyone within reach: Lydia, Steve's lover; his closest friends; and the policewoman assigned to track him down because people have disappeared and there are others, including Lydia, whose life and soul are in mortal danger unless The Song can be silenced.