The Daily Spin II
Wallows | Nothing Happens
Welcome back to the Daily Spin. For the uninitiated, this is the series in which I review an album every day of 2025.
As was the case two years ago, my favorite song from each album can be found at the playlist linked here.
Album: Nothing Happens (2019)
Artist: Wallows
Link:
It’s always tough to see your heroes get old. It happens in pretty much every fandom-tied activity - I think most anyone can call to mind a hero that’s said ‘that’s time for me’ and hung their gloves up for the last time.
It’s weird to stretch that metaphor to an album, but that’s honestly a bit how I feel with 2019’s Nothing Happens, from indie pop darlings Wallows. When this came out, I was just about to graduate college, and at a very specific point in my life where this was it - the exact sound I craved at a pivotal time, easily consumed, accessible, and in a very easily deliverable box to share and enjoy.
Looking back on it six years later, however, I find myself pretty blah on it - not that the sound is particularly dated - there’s a freshness to it, even after all this time, but I realize now how rote this production was and is. There’s not really much differentiating this from any of the 25 other indie albums that came out in 2019 doing this exact same thing beyond the fact that one of the guys starred in 13 Reasons Why.
When it’s great, as it is with ‘Remember When’ and Clairo-featuring ‘Are You Bored Yet?’, it’s fantastic, just the right touch of oomph to push it to that next level and keep things fresh, but most of the second half of the album is, dare I say it, kinda boring. Nothing really happens.
Rating: 7/10
Best Tracks: Remember When
Worst Tracks: Scrawny