From the opening lullaby of “A Perfect Miracle” through to the Morse Code fadeout at the close of “Sail on Through,” Spiritualized wrap layer upon layer of gloriously transcendent sound together to create a mesmerizing and cinematic collection of songs.
There are points where the waves of blissful noise are almost overwhelming – the thunderous climax of “On the Sunshine”; the spectral waltz of “The Prize”; the towering guitar solo on “I’m Your Man” – where one can imagine the studio’s speakers vibrating themselves off of the walls. Which is an incredible feat when you discover that the album was conceived and recorded almost entirely by one man – Jason Pierce, AKA J.Spaceman – in an upstairs room in his east London home. Sat in an edit suite in Whitechapel a month or so after finishing recording, Jason talks honestly about the painstaking, frustrating process of creating And Nothing Hurt.
“Making this record on my own sent me more mad than anything I’ve done before. We’d been playing these big shows and I really wanted to capture that sound we were making, but without having the funds to do so, I had to find a way to work within the constraints of what money I had. So I bought a laptop and made it all in a little room in my house.”
For the listener, the nine tracks on And Nothing Hurt effortlessly replicate the scale and power of Spiritualized’s previous releases, whether it’s the sonic blowback of “On the Sunshine,” the last dime in the jukebox love letter of “Let’s Dance” or the swell of an imaginary orchestra that seems to lift “Damaged” towards the heavens as it plays out.
Tracklist:
1. A Perfect Miracle
2. I’m Your Man
3. Here It Comes (The Road) Let’s Go
4. Let’s Dance
5. On The Sunshine
6. Damaged
7. The Morning After
8. The Prize
9. Sail On Through
Format: White-coloured, 12-inch Vinyl LP
Label: Bella Union
Catalog: BELLAVI800HZ
Released: 2018
Genre: Alternative / Psych
