The Slip

Nine Inch Nails continues the free music bonanza with a new album, The Slip.

The buzy Mr. Reznor has done more in the last few years than any other period leading his band, but that's not to say that it's been a mass of quality with his quantity. Year Zero was hardly in the same league as With Teeth, it's predecessor -- and the the remix album didn't improve much. Having essentially scored Saul Williams' Rise And Fall Of Niggy Tardust as a more urban, beat-poetry Nine Inch Nails, he came up with the ambient-instrumental Ghosts I-IV, which was their first online release.

The Slip has it's great moments, but also suffers from a lack of objectivity and rushed writing. These past years have seen the NIN output skyrocket, but perhaps at the cost of their greater legacy. The electro-punk rock direction away from the industrial, moody feel of The Downward Spiral and The Fragile makes the band sound at worst like a group that has found a lot of fancy gear, and at best Nine Inch Nails covering someone else. Much like the Smashing Pumpkins Mellon Collie, if they had paired down to half as much music, the collection would be amazing.

Through the glory of playlists and burned CDs, a terrific, hybrid Nine Inch Nails 2005-2008 could exist, but that's not the point here. There's a fair amount of throwaway tunes in the recent catalogue, but The Slip has far more promising music and less doodle-y filler. At a lean 43 minutes and with a quarter of that instrumental, the album finishes stronger than it starts. "Head Down" the halfway point of the 10 songs is a more recognizable NIN, if not a better thought out one. The piano and vocal combo of "Lights In The Sky" is a erie dirge, leading into "Corona Radiata", close to eight minutes of soundscape similar to the Further Down The Spiral sound. "The Four Of Us Are Dying" continues the theme, with a more upbeat electronic vibe.

Get your copy of The Slip in the format of your choosing.