Meshuggah "Nothing"

Nothing is the fourth studio album by Swedish extreme metal band Meshuggah, originally released in 2002. The album entered the Billboard 200 chart at number 165, slightly higher than the band's following effort, Catch Thirtythree.

A last-minute decision to join 2002's Ozzfest tour forced the band to mix the album in two days and to master it in one. As a result, the album had its guitars and drums re-recorded for a remastered re-release in 2006.

The songs on this album consist of slower tempos and a heavy focus on groove instead of the thrash metal style of previous albums. 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 on which guitarists Fredrik Thordendal and Mårten Hagström experimented with 8-string guitars by re-recording the guitar tracks, replacing the original performances made using detuned 7-string guitars, due in part to their custom Nevborn guitars not being ready.

The track "Rational Gaze" was promoted with three music videos. The first was a repetitive black-and-white sequence of pictures, and did not 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", was not an official video, but rather a handicam of Jens Kidman performing as his bandmates, with the help of different wigs. In January 2018, Loudwire named Nothing their favorite djent album.

Nothing has sold over 95,000 copies in the US.

A re-recorded and remastered version of the album was released on 31 October 2006. The new version features new rhythm guitar tracks re-recorded with 8-string guitars. The drums were also re-recorded by using the original drum hits as triggers for new audio produced with virtual drum software. The vocals were not re-recorded, but were given effects processing.

There are two songs significantly modified from their original version. These include the tempo of "Nebulous" which was lowered, and the track length of "Obsidian" was nearly doubled with the ending fadeout removed.

The re-release also includes a DVD containing music videos and their Download Festival performance in 2005, as well as modified cover art.

Track listing

All lyrics are written by Tomas Haake, except "Nebulous" by Mårten Hagström.

1. "Stengah" Hagström, Haake 5:38
2. "Rational Gaze" Thordendal 5:04
3. "Perpetual Black Second" Hagström 4:39
4. "Closed Eye Visuals" Thordendal 7:25
5. "Glints Collide" Thordendal, Haake 4:55
6. "Organic Shadows" Hagström, Haake 5:08
7. "Straws Pulled at Random" Hagström 5:10
8. "Spasm" Thordendal, Haake 4:14
9. "Nebulous" Hagström 6:33
10. "Obsidian" (instrumental) Meshuggah 4:20 (8:35 on the re-release)

Total length: 53:37/57:52

Enhanced multimedia section includes lyrics, credits, gear setup info, links & more.

The song titles appear only on the disc of the original pressing, and the lyrics only in the enhanced features section.

After the release of "Chaosphere", Meshuggah developed an 8-string guitar with the Sweden-based Nevborn company, which includes two bass guitar strings and a longer neck. "Nothing" was recorded in its entirety with its prototype, although it was written on 7-string Ibanez guitars tuned down to match the 8-string.

Recording information:

Recorded at Studio Dug-Out, Area 51 & Fear and Loathing in La Spånga.