Nada!

Album Review

Nada! was the breakthrough record where Death in June abandoned the mix of industrial noise, punk, and Joy Division-styled mayhem to embark on a new style of apocalyptical folk, and though Current 93, Death in June spin-off bands like Sixth Comm and Sol Invictus, and countless other groups on World Serpent followed that path, Death in June was one of the pioneers. Acoustic guitars feature heavily on "The Honour of Silence," the short "Leper Lord," "(Behind the Rose) Fields of Rape," and "She Said Destroy," most of them co-written with David Tibet of Current 93. In fact "Fields of Rape" has some of the same lyrics as the piece of the same name on Current 93's nightmarish Dogs Blood Rising, but instead of mixing nursery rhyme and distorted screams with industrial noises, the Death in June version turns the piece into a rather catchy folk song, though one imbued to the core with gloom and decay. The rest of the album traverses similar territory, despair and torture, death and war, utter bleakness. A few of the tracks revert to the earlier Death in June of mechanical rhythms and strange sound effects, and "Crush My Love" offers strange repeated keyboard textures and droning vocals with some weird effects at the end. Except for the stupid "C'Est un Reve," a piece about Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie, Nada! is excellent stuff.