Nine Inch Nails - Add Violence

Nine Inch Nails
Add Violence
2017
Spotify

I have to be honest, I've never been a Nine Inch Nails fan. It was music that I knew was technically incredible, but I never got that enjoyment out of listening to one of their records. Nine Inch Nails being signed to Interscope Records was recently chronicled in the HBO Documentary The Defiant Ones about Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine, and really gave me the impetus to try and re-discover Nine Inch Nails. From the start Add Violence is so incredibly focused, short at only 27 minutes but so very dialed in. Because Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross have been so busy touring and making soundtracks for movies their studio time was likely limited on this album. The result though is instead of meandering intros, outros and interludes Reznor gets to the point and allows it to continually expand. "The Lovers" is one of the best examples of this, as this electronic track sort of keys away creating a tension that Reznor only barely exploits. He could have easily gone into a full blow everything out of the water kind of track, but He allows it to be different and unique. The thing about Nine Inch Nails that I never understood is that aggression and the rage is only one aspect of their music, not the sum total. When you listen for the small pieces, the little nuances that make of the record it becomes something much different and exciting to dive into. The haunting nature of their music is still there, but the conclusions are much more cerebral on Add Violence.

At this point you would expect Nine Inch Nails would be past experimenting, but they do all over the place. "This Isn't the Place" has reznor singing with this very slight falsetto, that feels different and lovely. Rest assured NIN faithful, "Not Anymore" ensures that the rage is still there and just bubbling under the surface ready to explode. Yet it is the synths on "Not Anymore" which really shine and stand out adding this great percussive punch. The album closes on the epic "The Background World" and at 11 minutes long it feels a lot more like Reznor's cinematic work than it does a Nine Inch Nails song, but boy does it really work. The song is continually evolving and goes from utter distortion and breaks, almost begging you to turn it off until finally ending with utter noise. This where Nine Inch Nails always lost me, and actually lost me again with this song, the extended outro really doesn't serve a purpose or drive anything forward it just ends up taking half the song away and leads to nothing. There is a ton to like on this record, but the last track just leaves you feeling so annoyed and uncomfortable, it's hard to keep the great impression the other tracks leave you with intact. An acquired taste would likely be the best description for this record.

7.9 out of 10