Probably Smug.

WRNLRD - In From The Night Herd

Self-released in 2007, In From The Night Herd is the third full-length from WRNLRD, a nontraditional one-man black metal project out of Virginia. This album is an intense, considered exploration of dark ideas inspired by Cordwainer Smith’s 1961 story, “A Planet Named Shayol.” The depth of sound and somber vision of this 30-minute experimental album can be better appreciated with a reading of this story. “Shayol” is Smith’s twisted version of hell: a desolate planet where people are enslaved as organ growers, their bodies painfully mutated and kept alive involuntarily with the help of a powerful drug. Stripped of their ability to hope or dream, the victims in this story form “herds” that wander in eternal delirium while their organs are periodically harvested to sustain life on other planets. The hopelessness of the planet’s inhabitants and Smith’s grotesque imagery are communicated in this story with startling clarity and poignancy. Divided into two parts approximately 15 minutes each, In From The Night Herd conveys a parallel atmosphere of pain and oppression that succeeds in becoming its own monster. The album makes excellent use of programming, acoustic guitar, bass, vocals, fiddle and mouth harp to create an ongoing struggle between hostile noises from without and a fragile, sentient voice from within. Acoustic instruments and percussion are used sparsely, and buried vocals are difficult to distinguish.

Beginning with the short opening track, “Pain Planet,” the album unfolds like a weird dream on a dark planet floor. Deep, plane-shifting vibrations, strange banging, pulsating tones ringing high and low, distant sounds of wind and creatures, and obscure vocals all add to an eerie cacophony heard as if beyond a dreamlike veil. In the face of this looming wall of ambience it becomes impossible to hear every sound happening simultaneously, yet throughout the album no sound seems to repeat itself.

One can find several American influences on this album, some coming specifically from the West. One is the album’s title, also the title of a 1907 painting by American artist Frederic Remington that depicts a night scene from the Old West. The painting aptly mirrors the dark, uneasy feel of the album. Additionally, the word remuda in the track titled “Black Remuda” refers to a herd of horses that ranch hands use to select their mounts (the idea of a “herd” also finds its echo in Smith’s story). The persistent sound of wind on the album suggests wide open spaces, the kind that can be imagined as part of the bleak desert of Smith’s Shayol as well as North American prairies. In addition, a fiddle is played on the title track, an instrument typically used in American roots music such as bluegrass.

On tracks such as “Black Remuda,” an acoustic guitar enters with a pensive melody played one note at a time, seeming vulnerable in contrast to the surrounding noise that threatens to swallow it up. The fiddle on the final track whines with a high, keening melody played slowly and deliberately. Like the acoustic guitar, its wistful voice is nearly lost within the noise. The acoustic instruments narrate their own path through an unforgiving environment with plaintive notes that seem to cling to a thread of memory and sanity. The artwork appropriately mirrors the feel of the album with shadowed, enigmatic forms that can be glimpsed but not easily defined. Revealing more with each listen, Night Herd is an exceptional album that is both disquieting and thought-provoking.