Track By Tracks: Shepherds Of Cassini - In Thrall To Heresy (2025)

Thrall to Heresy is a concept album that dives into the psyche of the despot, the figure that the album revolves around.

1.Usurper:

The song is about our despot (a person who holds absolute power who uses it in a cruel and oppressive way) in full megalomaniac mode, power tripping, manic, violent and unhinged, believing he is above reproach by virtue of his charisma.

2 to 3. Shifting Gleam/Slough:

This song is a low point. He has acknowledgment of the horrific acts that the despot has committed and the realization that he can never expect to be forgiven. However, he refuses to accept outside help and determines that he will be solely responsible for his own reconciliation.

4 to 5.Vestibule/Red Veil:

This song is about the crucial moment in the despot's descent into madness. In the throes (intense and violent pain and struggle especially accompanying birth, death or great change) of self loathing chronicled in Slough, he seeks the counsel of a shaman or a witch doctor who administers to him some kind of hallucinogen in a ritual to help him communicate with his spirit animal, the pelican. But it goes wrong, it catalyzes a psychotic breakdown fueled by extreme paranoia, which culminates in him committing some irredeemable atrocity (perhaps killing his own son out of fear of being overthrown by him just like the god Saturn devouring his own son so not be overthrown by him). This is Vestibule, which is an intro to the next song Red Veil. Vestibule has no lyrics, but the mood of this piece is dark and menacing and works as a prelude to Red Veil.

Red Veil is what happens from this point on. There is no going back. The despot has debased his own humanity and extinguished any warmth he had left in his heart. The personality shift caused by the drug has eliminated his capacity to feel empathy or remorse. Only cruelty, rage and an insatiable lust for power are left to fill the vacuum within his psyche. He lays waste to communities and environments in his rampage, aided by an enclave of sycophants who will eventually be his undoing.

6 to 8. Mutineers/Abyss/Threnody:

This song is about our protagonist in the last hours of his life, fearing for perhaps the first time what will become of his spirit and his legacy after he passes away. He has visions of a pelican, the significance of which is unclear but could perhaps be a spirit animal, its enormous bill a metaphor for his gluttonous desires. He has long since fallen out of favor with the people who used to celebrate him, he has been overthrown at some point in a coup and his public image is in tatters. In a last ditch attempt at absolution, he climbs the church bell tower to get closer to his god and have his final say before his judgment. Even in his dying moments, he still can’t get out of his own way, and his ego clouds his ability to surrender fully to the divine. As he crosses the threshold of death, he sees a light that he interprets as a guide that will help him navigate the darkness of the afterlife.