Customer Reviews

Decay

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When someone asks me to describe the music of Nothing Inside, I always find myself at a loss for words. "Well," I usually say "It's like throwing Skinny Puppy, Depeche Mode, and Laurie Anderson into a blender, mixing them up really good, and them sprinkling some unidentifiable element in onto it all." If the person I'm talking to has no idea who those three acts are, I then say "It's evil electronic goodness." Neither description truly does Nothing Inside any justice, for it is that unidentifiable element that truly makes Nothing Inside what it is.

Out of their four releases, Decay is by far my favorite. It contains every element touched on the previous albums and exceeds them. Love, loss, and despair are running themes all throughout the album, but there is also an underlining theme of hope, that one day you will wake up and it will have all just have been some bad dream . . .

Decay starts off by telling us the hazards of music through various samples, followed by a request to "Please press stop on your disc player". But of course, the listener has already been enchanted. The album then moves into slower paced tales of disillusionment, which gradually grow in intensity. "Seversister" harshly proclaims that "Everything is dead" and the album spirals downward from there. "Tormentor", through some of the best use of samples I have ever heard, prepares us for death. But then, there is a calm before the storm. There is:

Fragmentary Blue.

Fragmentary Blue is a syth pop gem. It's a musical poem. It's an endless waltz. It's . . . Fragmentary Blue. One could easily just have this song on repeat until the end of time and be fully content, but then they would be missing out on what else Decay has to offer. For after this . . . all hell breaks loose.

"Hammer" is pure rage and one finds themself almost feeling sorry for the keyboards it was recorded with, wondering if they are still intact. But everyone has this kind of anger at least once in their life, and therefore the track is still not above the compression of the listener.

After venting, the album moves into a melancholy state, in which the musical talents of the group truly shine through. About halfway through the track "For M." is some of the best keyboard work I have ever heard . . .

Last but not least is "X 19", which is ten minutes of the apocalypse in music format. Every emotion addressed in the previous tracks appears again, but with the intensity increased to its maximum.

Every track on Decay sounds different, and yet this album flows better than most albums put out today. The only thing I compare it to in this aspect is Nine Inch Nail's The Fragile. You want to listen to the whole album, not just one song. And listen you will. Again and again and again . . .

I remember sitting in my friend Scott's living room. Mike Coleman had just run down (he lived upstairs from Scott) with the newly mixed Nothing Inside CD. He was so proud he was glowing, he even had a paste up of the new album cover. He put it in the stereo and I was blown away. That was the night I was the night I fell in love with Fragmentary Blue. That song has been haunting me ever since.

I remember sitting in BJ's apartment, just chilling, listening to End and having my BJ turn to Mike and say "So, Mike, what's it like seeing people just sitting around listening to your music?" I had no idea before that, that my friend Mike and the best band on the planet had anything to do with eachother. I was proud of myself, I didn't ask for his autograph right there and then. Now, I wish I had. I have no idea what happened to him. Apparantly, he's working on some solo stuff (or so sayeth nothinginside.com)

Ah the memories... so, the point: Nothing Inside, apart from being the best goth/industrial/synth-pop/?? in the world, rocks. Buy two. I just did.

-Alan [and yes, I do feel cheesy for writing the review, but somebody had to do it]

How do you describe perfection? Throw a dash of anger with incredible keyboarding, ethereal vocals, brilliant lyrics, and a tad of melancholy...you get Nothing Inside. Brilliantly produced and performed, this is their best yet. From the anger of Hammer to the hauntingly melancholy of Sililoqoy to the driving Sweetest Revenge, this is the one essential CD. From beginning to end you will not be able to put down the earphones and once you've heard it, you will not be able to forget it. Best track:..Silioqoy, hauntingly beautiful and by far the most brilliantly poetic song yet.

Merian Sullivan, 19, Marietta, Georgia