Nothing (album)

Nothing
Studio album by Meshuggah
Released	August 6, 2002
Recorded	2002
Genre	Extreme metal Technical metal
Length	53:09 58:33 (re-release)
Label	Nuclear Blast
Professional reviews
All Music Guide link Pitchfork Media 81% link Rolling Stone link Metal-Rules link Metal Review link Vampire Magazine (favorable) link
Meshuggah chronology
Chaosphere (1998) Nothing (2002) I (2004)
Alternate cover
Re-release (2006)

Nothing is the fourth album by Swedish metal band Meshuggah, originally released in 2002. It was re-recorded and re-mastered for a new re-release in 2006.

Summary

The songs on this album consist of slower tempos and a heavy focus on groove instead of the thrash metal stylings of previous albums. This stylistic change has led to mixed reviews from fans, though it has received a warmer reception from mainstream critics than the band's previous efforts have. Jazz fusion elements such as the interludes found in some songs on the band's Destroy Erase Improve album are still present in this release. This is also the first album where guitarists Fredrik Thordendal and Mårten Hagström experiment with 8-string guitar tunings, though the album was recorded using detuned 7-string guitars at the time of recording, due to their custom Nevborn guitars not yet being ready. The track "Rational Gaze" was promoted with three music videos; the first one was a repetitive black-and-white sequence of pictures, and didn't have much connection with the song structure; the second version, directed by Torbjörn Oyesvold, featured a blue-greenish environment with the band performing, heavy post-processed by blurry video filters; the third version, entitled "Mr. Kidman Delirium Version", wasn't entirely an official video, rather a handicam home video of Jens Kidman performing a song in the character of his bandmates, with the help of a bunch of wigs.

Track listing

1. "Stengah" – 5:38
2. "Rational Gaze" – 5:04
3. "Perpetual Black Second" – 4:39
4. "Closed Eye Visuals" – 7:26
5. "Glints Collide" – 4:56
6. "Organic Shadows" – 5:08
7. "Straws Pulled at Random" – 5:10
8. "Spasm" – 4:15
9. "Nebulous" – 6:33
10. "Obsidian" – 4:20

Re-release

A re-recorded and remastered version of the album was released on October 31, 2006. The new version features the rhythm guitar tracks re-recorded with new guitars and amplifiers. The guitar tracks on the original Nothing were recorded with detuned 7-string Nevborn guitars that suffered from bad intonation and became detuned between each recording. When guitarists Hagström and Thordendal were sponsored by Ibanez with custom 8-string guitars, they were so pleased with the results that they decided to re-record their parts with the new instruments. The drums were also redone by triggering the original drum hits using Drumkit from Hell Superior. The vocals were not re-recorded, but were given extra dramatic effects. Aside from the re-recorded guitars and triggered drum samples, there are only two songs significantly modified from their original version. The tempo of "Nebulous" has been lowered, and the length of "Obsidian" has nearly been doubled. Also the rest of the songs from the re-release seem to be minimally longer than the original release. The re-release also includes a DVD of video clips and their Download Festival performance in 2005, as well as modified cover art.

Track listing

1. "Stengah" − 5:38
2. "Rational Gaze" − 5:36
3. "Perpetual Black Second" − 4:39
4. "Closed Eye Visuals" − 7:25
5. "Glints Collide" − 4:56
6. "Organic Shadows" − 5:20
7. "Straws Pulled at Random" − 5:16
8. "Spasm" − 4:14
9. "Nebulous" − 7:06
10. "Obsidian" − 8:33

DVD track listing

1. "Straws Pulled at Random" – Live at Download 05
2. "In Death—Is Death" – Live at Download 05
3. "Future Breed Machine" – Live at Download 05
4. "Rational Gaze" – Official video
5. "Shed" – Official video
6. "New Millennium Cyanide Christ" – Official video
7. "Rational Gaze" – Mr. Kidman Delirium Version

Personnel

• Jens Kidman − vocals
• Fredrik Thordendal − rhythm guitar, lead guitar, bass
• Mårten Hagström − guitar
• Tomas Haake − drums, vocals on tracks; 4 and 8