Chat Pile & Hayden Pedigo – In the Earth Again
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Computer Students / Modulor
The conceit behind In the Earth Again is pretty simple. After relocating from the Texas Panhandle to Oklahoma, finger-picking virtuoso Hayden Pedigo discovered that he was neighbors with select members of the death metal noise rockers in Chat Pile. While these projects might seem to be at opposite ends of the acidity scale, after some short-form bonding, the two parties decided to make an album together, and it turns out their respective sounds actually dissolve together beautifully.
On one end, you have Chat Pile, known for grinding out sludgy and verbose tracks about the inhumanity and cruelty that it takes to exist within this particular moment of American nihilism. While their breakthrough God’s Country meditated on homelessness, gun violence, industrial waste, and drug addiction through brutal assaults, their soundtrack work flexed the band’s range and restraint. Highlights like “Lake Time (Mr. Rodan)” were complete genre pivots, offering a full-out country song about Godzilla characters that brought levity and charm to a discography otherwise filled with rightfully dour grievances.
Then you have Hayden Pedigo, who crafts sun-kissed and picturesque music that he plucks out on a velveteen acoustic guitar. Aiming to capture the natural beauty of his home state, the tracks on this year’s I’ll Be Waving As You Drive Away feel as if they could soundtrack rolling hills through your passenger window just as well as they could a placid day spent down by the lake. Much like Chat Pile extended past their noise rock norm, some of Pedigo’s early work included unnerving ambient tracks that counter-balanced his more digestible guitar playing.
With its Halloween release date and scorched-earth, hockey-mask-clad album cover, it might be easy to assume that In the Earth Again is a sort of spooky middle ground between the two artists' sounds. Granted, the first single was more or less what I would have expected from a crossover like this; the full album experience, however, offers a compelling journey filled with depth and compassion that is profound in ways I never could have anticipated.
“Outside” is a tranquil instrumental that wades listeners into the release, offering atmospheric swirls that float into your headphones like campfire smoke. “Demon Time” finds power in smouldering bass notes as Chat Pile vocalist Raygun Busch forecasts the return of evil spirits, repeating, “And they will find you / And they will fuck you up.” These apocalyptic scenes are merely the acclimating warm-up.
Three tracks in, we get our first drums as “Never Say Die!” feels like the most traditional track we’ve heard thus far. Even with the slow curdling heavy metal instrumental, there’s a tinge of haunting beauty tucked around the edges that makes everything feel a tad more palatable.
On some level, it would be easy to write about every track here, from the 7-minute assault on “The Matador” to the outright grace that chases it in “I Got My Own Blunt to Smoke,” but that sort of contrast is scattered across this record and exactly what makes it so beguiling. For every crushing, crunched-up guitar riff or cathartic cymbal crash, there’s an equal moment of thoughtful elegance that elevates the other. There are still lamentations that fans of Chat Pile will love, as well as peaceful guitar-led instrumentals for fans of Pedigo. The way those two sounds dance together makes something entirely unique and worth venturing into the heart of.
