Metalhead is narrated by Trish, a quiet sixteen-year-old girl who finds herself tutoring the school's bad-boy, metalhead Axl Varness. Trish fully expects the situation to end in an anxiety-inducing confrontation, but instead Axl begins to draw her out of her shell and, in turn, Trish finds that there is something beyond tattoos setting Axl apart from their peers: as easily as Axl can play a riff on his guitar, he can summon powerful creatures out of nothing more than soundwaves and his own imagination. When Axl is pushed to his limit by Trish's domineering boyfriend and by his own tragic home life, his already lacking impulse control erodes until he is on the brink of unleashing his hidden talent on the student body. As Axl begins to unravel, Trish is the only one who stands between him and utter destruction both to himself and to everyone around him.