In its earliest phases, Joe Mulherin's music as nothing,nowhere combined sharp trap production with hooky guitar-led instrumentals, with Mulherin singing and rapping lyrics informed by alienation, loss, and anxiety. The anxiety that he had long struggled with grew out of his control after the release of his 2018 album Ruiner, with Mulherin suffering regular, debilitating panic attacks. Tours were canceled and nothing,nowhere was put on pause as he regrouped and tried to make his mental well-being a top priority. Trauma Factory, the fourth proper studio album from nothing,nowhere, was the result of two years of experimentation with songwriting and genre, whittled down to its still hefty 15-song track listing from dozens of songs Mulherin wrote while playing with the stylistic boundaries of the project. Despite this wanton experimentation, Trauma Factory never strays too far into uncharted waters. Flirtations with melodic pop-punk on songs like "Fake Friend" and "Nightmare" are some of the record's best moments, amping up the usually low-energy approach of earlier albums and accentuating Mulherin's knack for hooky songwriting. There are synthy updates to the emo-rap template of earlier LPs on songs like "Lights [4444]" and the dreamy "Pain Place," and a more organic take on the grungy live instrumentation of "Pretend." More extreme genre dabbling comes with tracks like the overblown metal bludgeoning of "Death" and album closer "Barely Bleeding," which winds from an intro of soft acoustic guitar loops and delicate vocals into an epic post-hardcore climax. Trauma Factory rarely stays in the same mode from one song to the next, but its grab-bag approach never comes off as disjointed. Even with the quick-shifting styles, the emotional charge of the songs and Mulherin's distinctive songwriting sensibilities expand nothing,nowhere's range and keep the album from devolving into a scattered mess. ~ Fred Thomas, Rovi

1		trauma factory
2		lights (4444)
3		buck
4		love or chemistry
5		exile
6		upside down
7		pain place (feat. MISOGI)
8		fake friend
9		death
10		pretend
11		blood (feat. KennyHoopla & JUDGE)
12		nightmare
13		crave
14		real
15		barely bleeding