Nothing – A Short History of Decay

This blog has taken me quite a while to get out of my head and on to the screen. Nothing were the first major international band to entrust me with their album prior to it being released. That album was 2020’s The Great Dismal and it remains to this day an incredibly important record to me. I wrote about the sense of universal collapse that framed it, and how Domenic Palermo turned that weight into something strangely uplifting. That record felt like a culmination of sorts. A band fully aware of its power and realising a collection of songs so potent and urgent it left nothing more to say. Or so I thought. As it turned out this was Palermo’s thoughts at the time too. Luckily for us though, things were about to change.

Palermo released a collaborative post-metal album with Full of Hell in 2023 as well as launching a multi-generational shoegaze festival called Slide Away where they shared the stage with their long-time friends Whirr amongst many other shoegaze legends. With this flurry of activity, he also came to a realisation. One of introspection and of his own mortality. With him now entering is 40’s he was starting to feel the consequences of a life lived hard and fast. One lived on the road playing all over the world. Then came the diagnosis of the onset of essential tremors, a neurological disorder similar to Parkinson’s disease that causes the body to shake uncontrollably, both physically and verbally. Palermo had this to say.

So, it’s with that mindset he set about writing A Short History of Decay. This is their fifth album and their first for Run For Cover Records. The lineup is formidable. Palermo remains the axis, with Doyle Martin, Bobb Bruno, Zachary Jones and longtime collaborator Nick Bassett shaping the sound around him.

What direction would this take the music in? How would all this show up in the lyrics? There’s only one way to find out. Let’s drop the needle and see.

We open with ‘never come never morning’ in stark fashion. Clean guitar, piano, and a vocal that feels confessional. Lyrically he revisits childhood with a directness that catches you off guard. “When I was young, life was easy” he sings, before unspooling memories of violence and confusion. The string arrangement adds a solemn glow without tipping into sentimentality. This is Nothing at their most exposed. No shield of distortion. Just confession.

The awesome Nothing wave of fuzz returns on ‘cannibal world’ slamming the door open. Mechanised drums, abrasive guitars, and a chorus that circles the phrase “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” like a mantra. The industrial pulse influenced I’m sure by the closing tracks on My Bloody Valentine’s 2023 mbv album. It’s so great to hear that album being referenced like this, and it is only referencing. The band swathe this track in the existential dread and the trademark Nothing dynamics. The breakdown mid song is sublime and indicative of a band operating at their creative peak.

The title track ‘a short history of decay’ sits in the middle ground. The melody shimmers beneath layered guitars while Palermo questions the need for life lessons and redemption arcs. The production feels expansive yet controlled. Bassett’s touch is all over this, adding harmonic detail that lifts the chorus into something quietly anthemic.

Fuzz takes a backseat on ‘the rain don’t care’ replaced with a focus on melody. There is a worn elegance here, almost pastoral in places, before the band swell into a chorus that aches with resignation. I absolutely love the line “The rain don’t care for the life of a puddle”.  The arrangement is almost sixties in its feel. Guitars embrace you rather than bludgeon. It’s a sign of the band’s restraint and confidence that even so, it lands like an emotional uppercut.

You could be mistaken for thinking you were hearing the soundtrack to some spy thriller on ‘purple strings’. It’s stunningly ornate with its string arrangement giving it a bleak chamber pop quality. Palermo’s vocal floats above references to Manhattan, self-hypnosis, and narrow escapes. The juxtaposition of baroque instrumentation and urban anxiety is striking. Nothing have always understood the power of contrasting the everyday and the wonderful.

‘toothless coal’ returns to abrasion. The lyrics paint a picture of decadence and moral rot, with lines about living off the dead and other putrid instincts. The guitars grind with a metallic edge. This is where the band channel their more confrontational nature. Those industrial breakbeats appear again which only adds to the tracks overall sense of claustrophobia and paranoia.

‘ballet of the traitor’ carries a political undercurrent. Cities built on holy ground, bodies stripped and sanctified, betrayal rendered as choreography. The rhythm section locks into a muscular groove while the guitars circle in wide arcs. Just check out those drums. There remains a cinematic quality here. You can almost see the crumbling skyline in your mind’s eye as you listen.

The guitar riff that opens ‘nerve scales’ has a Radiohead vibe to it. Which is apt for a song that explores anxiety in motion. The repeated refrain “it blurs it out” mirrors the mental fog described in the verses. The drums feel almost danceable, yet the mood remains tense. It captures the sensation of pushing forward while something gnaws away at you.

To close out the album Palermo has chosen ‘essential tremors’ which I think was the right decision. By returning to intimacy he sings about absence, regret, and the physical reality of his condition. The line “honesty ain’t free” lingers. The song builds into a wall of distortion, yet his voice stays present in the mix. You hear the tremor sure but by god you hear his resolve. It’s a fucking brave way to end the record.

What strikes me most about A Short History of Decay is how unguarded it feels. This is a band who could have doubled down on volume and reputation, who could have delivered another monolith of fuzz and called it a day. Instead, they have turned inward. They have allowed time, regret and physical frailty to shape the songs rather than hide behind them.The honesty is front and centre. Across these nine tracks Nothing confront the past, question the present and stare straight at what comes next. The result is a record that feels both deeply personal and sonically vast. If The Great Dismal was about staring into the void, A Short History of Decay is about recognising the cracks in your own reflection. It asks you to consider how time marks the body and the mind. It asks you what honesty costs. And it leaves you with a sense that decay, documented with this level of clarity, can still produce something fiercely alive.

A Short History of Decay is released 27 February 2026 via Run For Cover Records. You can check it out over on the Nothing Bandcamp page.

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Photo Credit

Luke Ivanovich