Nothing – “Famine Asylum”
In three days, the Philadelphia band Nothing will release the new album The Great Dismal. It absolutely destroys. There’s always been an interesting tension at the heart of Nothing — hardcore hooligans who have been through serious real-life shit and who now make majestic and pretty shoegaze. But that tension really comes to the fore on The Great Dismal, where the pretty parts are prettier and the heavy parts are heavier. You can hear that in the early singles “Say Less” and “Bernie Sanders,” and you can also hear it in the new track that Nothing have just shared.
“Famine Asylum” has some serious low-end churn, and bassist Aaron Heard, who is also the frontman of Jesus Piece, gets extremely busy. Frontman Dominic Palermo delivers all his lyrics in a celestial, multi-tracked sigh, and the guitars twinkle and soar. The song doesn’t exactly sound pessimistic, but the lyrics are all about how human extinction might be the best thing for the world: “Send the bombs/ We’ve had enough of us.” Check it out below.
The Great Dismal is out 10/30 on Relapse Records; pre-order it here. Also, Nothing are playing a livestreamed record-release show with Full Of Hell 10/29; you can get tickets here. And speaking of members of Nothing doing livestreamed shows: Code Orange, still the masters of livestreamed sets in the quarantine era, are playing a show 10/31 with Jesus Piece, Year Of The Knife, and Machine Girl — the planned openers for their spring tour — all joining them. You can get tickets for that one here.