Out NOW
Via Run For Cover Records / Civilians
Words by: Angela Croudace
Some bands you admire from a distance. Others quietly soundtrack chapters of your life. For me, Nothing have always been the latter. Their dense, dreamy, quietly devastating strain of shoegaze fills the spaces in my head I didn’t realise were empty. There’s comfort in their distortion and a safety in the sadness.
What I’ve always loved about Nothing is their ability to make heaviness feel beautiful. Guitars arrive in tidal waves of fuzz and feedback, but beneath the haze there’s vulnerability that’s raw, exposed, painfully human. I’d been following the singles from A Short History of Decay closely, already hooked, curious how the full record would breathe as a complete piece.
Never Come, Never Morning opens unexpectedly restrained. An acoustic guitar leads, delicate and spacious, with Domenic ‘Nicky’ Palermo eerie, soft vocal hovering above it. When the drums enter, the song gathers momentum without losing its fragility. Synths bloom subtly in the background. It feels morose and reflective, highlighted with the line, ‘Life was easy when I was young.’ It’s not the explosive opener I anticipated, but that restraint makes it land harder.
Cannibal World shifts gears entirely. Gritty, urgent, industrial- all grinding textures that shift the balance of the opener. The percussion almost mimics a programmed early-’90s machine pulse, while Nicky’s voice floats above it, dreamy and detached. That juxtaposition, the mechanical abrasion against fragile melody, is what makes it a standout. It carries that brooding alternative metal atmosphere with romantic melancholy threaded through it. Even the AI-styled video, while controversial, visually captured that sense of urban decay and storm-heavy skies. The track ends on a final lingering guitar.
The title A Short History of Decay track leans into that same shadowy romanticism. Chiming, slightly theatrical guitar tones reminiscent of early ’90s alternative gloom-pop. Nicky’s vocals sit buried in the mix, almost swallowed by distortion, but it feels intentional like another instrument rather than the focal point. It’s immersive rather than immediate. Not my favourite, but one I can sink into.
The Rain Don’t Care pulls everything back again. Acoustic, slower, almost weightless. It feels like floating in grey space providing a break in the album’s harsher edges. There’s a morose calm to it, something that could soundtrack insomnia or meditation, beautiful but faintly uncertain.
Purple Strings opens acoustically too, carrying a familiar melancholic chord progression that echoes the emotional pull of early Radiohead yet darker, more sinister. The string arrangements are stunning. There are delicate flourishes music-box like tones that give it a fragile, almost childlike eeriness. It builds patiently, percussion striking at just the right moments. Lyrically poetic and quietly devastating.
Toothless Coal remains my favourite. It’s perfect to me. Industrial edges grind beneath Nicky’s impossibly dreamy vocal delivery, which carries that smooth, melancholic tone often heard in atmospheric alternative metal frontmen of the early 2000s. It’s moody, textured, balanced — heavy without losing its beauty.
Ballet of the Traitor softens the blow again, leaning into dreamscape minimalism with simple, chiming guitar lines that nod toward post-punk melancholy. There’s a clear pattern emerging: this album understands balance. Not every track throws you into distortion; the push and pull between abrasion and fragility feels deliberate.
Nerve Scales continues that softer arc before blossoming into something quietly beautiful by its end, cymbals shimmering with a surreal, almost out-of-body quality.
Essential Tremors closes the album with restraint. Pared-back vocals, gentle strumming, slow-building drums. Around the two-minute mark, urgency creeps in. The acoustic grows more insistent, and finally that familiar industrial grind resurfaces, rounding the album out with tension before it dissolves.
A Short History of Decay feels like reconnecting with an old friend who understands your worst thoughts but never judges them. It doesn’t attempt reinvention. It deepens what was already there, sinking further into melancholy, into that blur between comfort and chaos. Listening to this album feels like staring at the ceiling at 2am, reflective yet calm.
And that’s exactly why I keep coming back.
