Some music plays and breathes. “Hinterlands,” the sixth track on Harry Verheijen’s Fields of Passage, is a rare example of instrumental storytelling done with restraint, patience, and stunning emotional depth. It begins like dawn over a frost-covered forest: hushed, still, and awash in silvery light. Then slowly, almost imperceptibly, it builds—layer by layer—into something vast and quietly majestic. There’s no rush, no climax engineered for drama. Instead, Verheijen lets the soundscape unfold like a long exhale, filled with reverence for the open wilderness that inspired it.
Crafted with a Hagstrom F-100 and a Fender Telecaster, the guitars aren’t just instruments here—they’re the terrain. Thanks to Verheijen’s use of his custom Cluster Moonlight Delay, tones ripple and hover, creating an effect that feels like fog rolling over treetops or light bouncing off a river’s surface. The interplay is subtle but hypnotic: one guitar breathes, the other responds, and suddenly you’re in motion, even if you haven’t moved an inch. This is music made for headphones and solitude, for the moments between moments where silence and sound intertwine.
Supporting this shimmering core is a rhythm section so organic, it feels more like part of the environment than part of the song. The drums—Futuro and Lotus—don’t drive, they drift. Their percussive touches echo like footsteps in snow or a distant echo off a canyon wall. There’s nothing showy here; instead, there’s texture, feel, and intention. Verheijen isn’t trying to impress—he’s trying to communicate, and he does it by stepping back and letting the mood lead. Every detail feels earned, from the slightly surreal touches added through the “Eggs of Satan” and “Voodoo Spicy Flavour” plugins, to the delicate ambient pulses that come and go like passing clouds.
Michael Southard’s mastering work is the unsung hero of the track. It holds everything in place without suffocating the air in between. “Hinterlands” feels expansive because it is—there’s space carved into the mix, allowing each sonic detail to live and linger. It’s clean, yes, but never clinical. Wildness hums just beneath the surface, like something primal moving quietly beneath glass. There’s a sense that the track could vanish at any second, but it doesn’t—it simply waits for you to notice it.
With “Hinterlands,” Verheijen doesn’t offer a soundtrack to the wilderness—he offers a portal into it. It’s the kind of track that shifts depending on when and where you hear it. At sunrise, it feels like a promise. At dusk, reflection. And in between, it becomes the stillness we often forget to seek. Verheijen isn’t just composing—he’s mapping, sketching sound onto memory, mood, and moment. “Hinterlands” won’t shout to be heard, but listen closely, and it’ll take you far beyond where you thought you’d go.
