Nothing Is Real's third album of 2020, 'Regeneration Through Self Devourment' is a chaotic collection of dystopian nightmare visions, seemingly the climax that the band has been building up to through all their work so far. Described as 'a study of the cycles of death and rebirth, and man's current enslavement to technology and inevitable destruction', it foretells the downfall of mankind in a kind of technological singularity, with humanity devouring itself by means of the artifices we have created for ourselves ('Cleansed In The Fires Of Kali'), before re-emerging like a phoenix from the ashes of our own self-immolation ('The Perseverance Of Beauty (Rebirth Into A Golden Dawn)') .
This is the most chaotic and densely complex of NIR's works so far, and probably the most extreme, with big angry riffs of the kind we've come to expect from the hands of Nicholas Turner, wrapped into convoluted, psychotic structures which twist and turn like the streets of an unfriendly, Kafkaesque city. All this is overlaid with the kind of tortured screams and growls that bring to mind Turner's other projects Obsidian Hooves and Feral Lord. In many ways this album is the place where the 3 bands meet. Are Turner's projects starting to bleed into each other? Yes, but they always did to a certain extent, and it somehow sounds like it was meant to be. With this album NIR manages to appeal to black metal, death, sludge and doom crowds simultaneously, and that is never easy unless you sound like Bog Body or Tchornobog.
Stand out songs at this early stage are: 'To Devour Itself Blindly (At The Hands Of Machines)' and the opener 'To Gaze Upon This Fabrication Of Steel'.
The album is comes out on 31st Dec and is available for pre order now, and there might still be some download codes left on the NIR page. (JC)
https://nothingisreal333.bandcamp.com/album/regeneration-through-self-devourment
