Friday 16 July Saturday 17 July Sunday 18 July Monday 19 July Tuesday 20 July Wednesday 21 July Thursday 22 July Friday 23 July Saturday 24 July Sunday 25 July Monday 26 July Tuesday 27 July Wednesday 28 July Thursday 29 July Friday 30 July Saturday 31 July Sunday 1 August Monday 2 August Tuesday 3 August Wednesday 4 August Thursday 5 August Friday 6 August Saturday 7 August Sunday 8 August Monday 9 August Tuesday 10 August Wednesday 11 August Thursday 12 August Friday 13 August Saturday 14 August Sunday 15 August Monday 16 August Tuesday 17 August Wednesday 18 August Thursday 19 August Friday 20 August Saturday 21 August Sunday 22 August Monday 23 August Tuesday 24 August Wednesday 25 August Thursday 26 August Friday 27 August Saturday 28 August Sunday 29 August Monday 30 August Tuesday 31 August Wednesday 1 September Thursday 2 September Friday 3 September Saturday 4 September Sunday 5 September Monday 6 September Tuesday 7 September Wednesday 8 September Thursday 9 September Friday 10 September Saturday 11 September Sunday 12 September Monday 13 September Tuesday 14 September Wednesday 15 September Thursday 16 September Friday 17 September Saturday 18 September Sunday 19 September Monday 20 September Tuesday 21 September Wednesday 22 September Thursday 23 September Friday 24 September Saturday 25 September Sunday 26 September Monday 27 September Tuesday 28 September Wednesday 29 September Thursday 30 September Friday 1 October Saturday 2 October Sunday 3 October Monday 4 October Tuesday 5 October Wednesday 6 October Thursday 7 October Friday 8 October Saturday 9 October Sunday 10 October Monday 11 October Tuesday 12 October Wednesday 13 October Thursday 14 October Friday 15 October Saturday 16 October Sunday 17 October Monday 18 October Tuesday 19 October Wednesday 20 October Thursday 21 October Friday 22 October Saturday 23 October Sunday 24 October Monday 25 October Tuesday 26 October Wednesday 27 October Thursday 28 October Friday 29 October Saturday 30 October Sunday 31 October Monday 1 November Tuesday 2 November And surprisingly, for music built on what I'm sure was cutting edge audio technology of the early 90s, The Downward Spiral sounds only the slightest bit aged, and not too far flung from the aggro-beats that still rule alt-rock formats.
Still, even with all that precedent, Reznor must've done something to usher industrial music into the mainstream. My best guess is that Nine Inch Nails hit upon just the right amount of dance music content to gloss up his dire tunes without scaring off the homophobes.
Reznor's dance leanings are constantly bubbling just under the surface of The Downward Spiral , and it nearly goes without saying that the breakout hit, "Closer", leaned a bit more obviously in that direction than most of the rest of the album.
Easily the record's sexiest song and slinkiest beat, its disco thump still sounds markedly current. Meanwhile, "Heresy", for all its Nietzsche-inspired deicide, is a couple clicks of the distortion dial away from being a Depeche Mode song. And don't forget, "March of the Pigs" beat "Firestarter" to the digital hardcore punch by three years.
The B-side-filled second disc of this reissue assists this hindsight. Reznor was always fond of emphasizing clubby rhythms rather than tortured screams on his many, many self-remixes. The remix replaced the original's jazzy sparseness with a graveyard of broken breakbeats. And for fuck's sake, there's even a cover of Soft Cell's "Memorabilia" to balance out the much-too-easy goth karaoke of "Dead Souls", the set's other homage.
Reznor might've gone off the art-rock deep end with The Fragile , an album I have absolutely no recollection of whatsoever, but The Downward Spiral still holds together, aided by a few musical reprises and its monochromatic lyrical content. Reznor had his album dynamics down pat at the time, chasing the brutal Gaspar Noe rape of "Big Man with a Gun" with "A Warm Place", the closest thing a teenager got to Eno in that era.
Even the much-overrated "Hurt", which I didn't even like in the hands of a dying country singer, is a suitable post-storm calm. That Reznor's chainsaw guitars haven't dulled after a decade of Stabbing Filter Manson knockoffs is gratifying, and that they still cut glass-- remastering or no-- is a credit to his production skills. With the benefit of Dolby 5.
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