Everything, nothing ! The beginning the end ! (The Downward Spiral - Nine Inch Nails)

Member Name: 666disturbed

Product:	The Downward Spiral - Nine Inch Nails
Date:	11/07/02 (215 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Nothing on earth is as pwerful as this album

Disadvantages: Male orientated album only

Adults only please
18+ some lyrics contain offensive words

It's taken me a long while to think of what i could ever say about NIN that would do them justice (8years actually) !

Well here goes, The Downward Spiral is more than just an album made up of songs, it is a philosophy, it is a story of despair and ruin, of hopes being crushed and a man being reduced into taking his own life.

This in my experience is not an album for women, (nothing sexist ladies), it is a mans story of testostarone fuelled insanity and the anger and pain that men feel inside and are loathed to express in this stereotypical society.
Reznor puts it all together beautifully, in this conglomoration of madness.

The album starts with Mr.SelfDestruct, it is the characters own persona, a way of life which alienates all around him, the speedy riffs and energy of the song suggest an instant delerium to the album (indeed it starts with the sound of someone beating a punch bag). The song title and content also suggests that the characters problems are all self inflicted, all men feel this at times.

Piggy, without too much detail piggy is the first track which deals with feelings towards others namely the wife or girlfriend of our man in the story, when Trent spits the lyrics "hey pig there's a lot of things i hoped you would make me understand", the impression is that it is being sung from the heart, and that this may have been Reznors personal experience of relationships that he is singing about.

Heresy & March of the Pigs. The dictionary describes the word heresy as "to go against the orthodox teachings of ones community", and indeed this is what Trent appears to be singing about, "I wanna break it up, i wanna smash it up,i wanna f*ck it up, i wannna watch it come down". He is of course refering to society, angry and frustrated about the inability to fit into the petty rules of a modern day life. March
of the Pigs refers to the draconian measures of modern life, policed to the point of paranoia. The songs are sung to disturbing industrial heavy beats reflecting the characters despair.

Closer, the one that everybody knows, is in fact the first mental sanctuary on the album. Reznor sings about wanting to "f*ck you like an animal" and "you bring me closer to god", it is in fact only the temporary relief from the madness which comes from having sex with a stranger, (clearly not the wife/girlfriend of previous mention), but as i said, it is only temporary relief as the album begins it's more rapid descent of the human soul.

Ruiner, A song which could only reflect the characters inner struggle with life and all it's more unpleasant aspects. "Ruiner's a collector, he's an infecter, serving his sh*t to his flies" and "Maybe they f*cked me up much more than you'll ever know", in fact all the lyrics point towards the man on the edge of reality about to fall into the abyss of his own dark mind. Ruiner refers to all those which have hurt and betrayed our character.

The becoming. The opening line "I beat my machine, it's a part of me, it's inside of me. I'm stuck in this dream it's changing me i am becoming". Our character has gone over the edge and is well on the way down the spiral towards the end of his miserable life. Further lyrics repeat over and over, "It won't give up, it wants me dead, and god damn this noise inside my head".
Whilst listening to the album my bottom lip was beginning to shake by this point as the insanity and despair washes over during what i consider to be one of the finest songs of all time. 8 years later and i still find this part of the album particularly emotional.

I do not want this. Our character's last attempt at reality as he slips away into madness. This track has very heavy instrumentals in places
, but when listened to carefully Trents voice can be heard, "I'm always falling down the same hill, bamboo puncturing the skin, and nothing comes bleeding out, it's just like a waterfall i'm drowning in, two feet below the surface i can still make out your wavy face, and if i could just reach you, maybe i could leave this place", from here on inward or downward there is only pain on the album and the bitter taste it leaves.

Big man with a gun. Our character has become quite the maniac, singing about rape, control and murder. The song is about power and the solid determination in our mans mind to drag others down the spiral with him as the journey to madness continues to spiral downwards.

A warm place. The second sanctuary on the album, with no lyrics this is a moving instrumental which is like finding an oasis in a desert, but knowing that youy can't stay there and that your journey must eventually continue no matter how difficult or dangerous. (Obviously the journey is in our mans mind, but i'd like to think all the pain is left behind at this point on the album, only hatred and death are left now).

Eraser, following a long and disturbing intro the song has several short lines which epitomise our characters journey from start to end, with the emphasis on the wife/girlfriend being much of his lifes horrors. I won't list the lyrics, others on Dooyoo have, but i think it loses it's immense power when seen as words, it should be listened to very carefully to fully understand the sadness that Reznor is trying to portray.

Reptile. A song dedicated to the wife/girlfriend, a mental picture is constructed of a man on the verge of suicide remembering all the sh*t that has brought him to his current juncture, sat with a gun in hand, trying to figure out where it all went wrong. The portrayl of the said woman is that of a whore, with lyrics "she leaves a trail of honey to show me where she's bee
n, and, seeds from a thousand others drip down from within". A now truly disfunctional individual.

The downward spiral. The penultimate song is the suicide. "He couldn't believe how easy it was, he put the gun into his mouth, bang, so much blood for such a tiny little hole, a lifetime of f*cking things up, fixed, in one, determined flash". The mood of the song is sombre & distant, at the end you truly feel there is nothing left. The album leaves the listener emotionally exhausted and in my case actually changed my entire perceptions on life like nothing on else on earth ever could, sound far fetched ? Then try actually doing this trip with Trent sometime before ridiculing this opinion.

The album ends with hurt, which i feel summarises the rest of the album beautifully, but don't take my word for it, i'm only one of millions of NIN fans who have taken Reznors industrial music, and embraced it regardless of it's thorns.

I hereby end what will probably be my most heartfelt review on Dooyoo, i feel no more passion about anything else except my music.

666disturbed

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