Belgian experimental metal outfit EMPTINESS are streaming their seventh full-length album, "Nowhere Speaks," in its entirety today via the Season of Mist YouTube channel, a day ahead of its official release this Friday, July 17.
Save for vocals, keyboards and additional effects, the entire album was performed live in the studio, the product of four years of preparation, rehearsals and tests aimed at capturing a specific kind of tension the band felt could not survive being assembled in pieces. The approach marks a deliberate reversal from EMPTINESS' previous record, "Vide" (2021), which was distortion-free, sung entirely in French, and built around near-silence. "Nowhere Speaks" moves in the opposite direction, returning to density and weight.
The album's central structural idea ties it directly to the band's 2014 record "Nothing But The Whole." That album's abrupt mid-riff ending became one of the more discussed gestures in underground metal, baffling fans for years. Opening track "Nothing But The Whole (Part 2)" picks up exactly where that riff cut off, while the closing track of "Nowhere Speaks" loops back to that 2014 album's opening riff, sealing the two records into a single, deliberate cycle with no fixed beginning or end.
We reviewed "Nowhere Speaks" ahead of its release and gave it a 9/10, praising a record that demands active listening to reveal its intricate layering: once engaged, the dense blend of death metal, black metal, post-metal and industrial elements "closes around you, and there's no obvious way back out." Read our full review here.
"Nowhere Speaks" spans ten tracks and a 41:44 runtime, arriving via Season of Mist.
"Nowhere Speaks" Track Listing:
- Nothing But The Whole (Part 2) — 01:19
- The Threat — 04:07
- Nowhere Speaks — 05:37
- Darkness Commands — 01:02
- Words To Wind — 08:24
- One Must See All — 01:29
- When The Whole Arrives — 05:43
- The Clash Of Forces — 03:08
- Next In Line — 04:15
- All For Nothing — 06:37
Pre-order & Pre-save "Nowhere Speaks": orcd.co/emptinessnowherespeaks