A Look Back - Nine Inch Nails The Fragile

A look back – Nine Inch Nails The Fragile

“And when I suck you off not a drop will go to waste. It’s really not so bad ya know once you get past the taste.”

Starfuckers, Inc.

There were a lot of albums of my youth that were a big deal and Nine Inch Nails The Fragile was probably the biggest.  So far this is one of the few albums featured on this segment that I didn’t personally own.  However if you listened to the radio or occasionally watched MTV you heard a majority of this double album and certainly the best of it without all the fucking interludes.  I’ll eventually get around to taking a look back at one of my favorite albums, Tool’s “Ænima”, but the same thing that irritates me about that album goes double for this one.  If it’s one thing I hate about “Ænima” is all the time and space wasting interludes in that album.  Since “The Fragile” it seems Trent Reznor has made a career out of time and space wasting interludes.  So much so I’m sure you could fill an LP or even double album with all the damned things.  Once again I’m reminded of Joy Division, they used new recording techniques, technology, and instruments to create new and beautiful music.  Generation X did the same thing but rather than make something productive out of it used these techniques to make interludes that most people don’t care about and usually skip over.  God bless the advent of the compact disc that gave us a more efficient way of doing that.  Needless to say I and I’m sure the entire music listening public buys albums to listen to music not creepy sound effects and ambient noise of you fucking around in the studio.  But I digress; I suppose I should get around to reviewing the actual music.

Nine Inch Nails previous and most popular album was released a long 5 years earlier and since then all Reznor had been up to was a few soundtrack appearances.  I’ve always found it bizarre how musicians can go on such long hiatuses and music companies still stick with them.  “The Downward Spiral” was another big album but I didn’t listen to it on the whole until I was well into my 20’s.  The album was released while I was still in grade school (I think I may have been in the fifth or sixth grade) so I didn’t have much interest in it outside it’s first single “Closer”.  Back then I just thought it was cool that a mainstream single that got regular radio play featured that many fucks in it.  Mind you I didn’t have the slightest clue what the context of the song meant and now that I do find it very immature and shallow.  And ya know after a look back at “The Fragile” shallow and immature are recurring themes.

Every song on this album is directed at someone who wronged Trent Reznor showing that he can hold a grudge as bad if not worse than Taylor Swift, Alanis Morissette, and Fred fucking Durst.  I remember hearing rumors at the time that the subject of the main theme of the album was the volatile relationship Reznor had with Courtney Love… not the be unsympathetic but assuming that’s true ya shoulda known better buddy.  The secondary and more obvious subject of Reznor’s wrath was Marilyn Manson.  As I remember it’s Reznor we have to thank for Manson’s career.  At some point they had a falling out and by the time this album was released they resolved those issues which is quite frankly bizarre because “Starfuckers Inc.” was allegedly about Manson and he even appeared in the video(Reznor calls him a bitch a few times in the son.).  Making the “Starfuckers” less genuine is Reznor ripping off the chorus to Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain”.  I kinda always hated that song but now in retrospect I think I hate it even more.

The other singles off this album were more solid.  Although “We’re In This Together Now” got a little too much airplay it’s still a good song but whenever I’m listening to this album I just skip over it.  After that song wore out its welcome “Into the Void” took its place.  It got just as much airplay but for whatever reason I can’t get enough of this song.  It reminds me a lot of “Hurt” off “The Downward Spiral”.  No matter how many times I hear it it never gets old.  I can say the same about “Somewhat Damaged”.  It wasn’t a favorite of mine but grew on me after a while and there have been times where I play it over and over.  I was reading on Wikipedia while doing a little research about this album and it’s themes.  Wikipedia claims “Somewhat Damaged” was one of the songs played on a loop to torture prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.  I can think of way worse songs to torture people with.  Off the top of my head N’Sync’s “Bye, Bye, Bye” anything by John Meyer or The Haunted and MIA’s “MAYA”. 

Even though I disagree with the sentiments of the lyrics musically it’s still and Nine Inch Nails album and that means it’s still pretty good.  There’s a ton of interludes but this time at least they’re musical interludes which makes the album more listenable on the whole.  Up to this point Nine Inch Nails haven’t released a bad album and with “The Fragile” they still haven’t.  This album lacks the manic energy and creativity of its predecessors but in spite of its flaws I think it still holds up. 80/100