Nothing More. Photos courtesy of Eleven Seven Music.
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Possibly the two best terms to describe Nothing More’s self-titled album, which dropped today. The San Antonio-based quartet’s fourth album may be one of the best pure rock albums of the year. Songs like “Christ Copyright” and “This Is The Time (Ballast)” stand out as being heavy hitting yet melodic in approach.
“This record was the culmination of about three to five years of life experiences,” vocalist Jonny Hawkins said in May during an interview with The Pit. “From the day we started writing the record to the day we finished it it was about two to three years. We had already spent a lot of time on it and I like to call it ‘slow cooking.’ We get a little more juice when we give it some time and don’t rush it.”
Hawkins said of the album that Nothing More had written about 60 song ideas and narrowed it down to 20, which then they had to whittle down to 17 songs, which is still a pretty long record.
“Once we had it all down and all the content and lyrics were done, the whole concept kind of revealed itself,” Hawkins said. “What I mean by that is when we were younger, we all grew up in the church. So we all kind of grew up with a religious and biblical background.”
Nothing More’s religious upbringing shines through in the album, with Hawkins citing that many of the lyrical content comes directly from the literature and scripture the band was brought up on. For example, “This Is The Time (Ballast)” is about the struggle of doing something for the greater good and what happens to people when that concept is distorted and damaged in a way that it only does harm.
“Christ Copyright” is a song that describes how religion and the promise of afterlife has become something people think they can buy and sell as opposed to opening their soul to the divine. The fourth song on the album, ” Mr. MTV,” seems to stay in line with this theme but in another way. The song discusses this attitude of always wanting more and that those things people lust after are fake, cheap or sinful. In a way, it’s almost mocking MTV for some of it’s portrayal of the youth of today.
“One of the concepts we saw reflected in the song content is the basically there are two baptisms: baptism by water and baptism by fire,” Hawkins said. “The baptism by water was kind of a symbol of a new path and a new direction, almost like a divine ‘Ah ha!’ moment. Then there’s the baptism by fire for everything after that turning point. Basically, it’s the path that you walk in life and kind of the refining process that comes after that.”
Hawkins added that the first half of the record has more watery themes while it progressively gets more into the fire themes.
This statement stands out as the album progresses from song to song, with heavier rhythms and riffs with lyrical content to match. “Sex and Lies” is a clear indicator of this and yet the song stands out for being something completely different than the rest of the album, with a combination of fast and slow tempo with differentiating vocals.
Overall, Nothing More’s latest uses a variety of techniques and sounds in all aspects of the music to create one of the more original and innovative rock albums of the year.
Be sure to pick up Nothing More’s self-titled album and catch them later this year with Five Finger Death Punch, Volbeat and Hellyeah for a US tour.
