Perfect Drugs: The Top 10 Songs of Nine Inch Nails

Nine Inch Nails is by far one of the more interesting and talented acts in the industrial scene today. Below, in no particular order, are my ten favorite NIN songs. I like many, many more than these, but If i were to list them all this article would be several hundred pages long. So, without further ado:

Closer--You cannot mention Nine Inch Nails without mentioning Closer, off The Downward Spiral. When most people think of NIN, they're probably thinking of the angry lyric "I wanna @#$% you like an ANIMAL!" or picturing the nightmare-inducing video. The song itself starts with rhythmic beat, like a heart beat, then builds on that rhythm slowly but inexorably. The song, of course, is about sex (of the very-definitely-NOT-making-love variety) as the singer tries to fill the growing void in his life.

My favorite part of the song is not the beginning with the familiar lyrics. I prefer the section of the song when the words are over as the song builds to a climax, and then slowly winds down. Naturally, this is the part that gets butchered and chopped up for length on radio replays, so I really don't like listening to the song on the radio much.

The Perfect Drug--This piece was released on the soundtrack for a move called Lost Highway, and this song was the one that really fist introduced me to NIN. This was accomplished though the video, which has many allusions to Edgar Allen Poe and, like the video for Closer, is is odd and somewhat disturbing. It is also very rare and hard to hunt down.

The song isn't exactly subtle about its subject matter--though you could interpret the lyrics as being about a relationship, the song very much seems to describe a fascination with and a crippling addiction to narcotics. But I come for the beat, and the DRUM SOLO FROM GOD in the midpoint of the song. This song starts fast, gets faster, and then rumbles on high with that solo before winding down on a piano mournfully playing along with the line "without you...without you...everything falls apart..." It's an intense roller coaster of a song.

Wish--I listen to NIN for two reasons: either I want something to pick me up or calm me down. "Wish," off the Broken EP, is one of the songs I turn to to get my blood pumping. It's a fast-paced, screaming ball of rage and vehemence. It's not a long track, but it picks you up and moves through you. When I'm listening to "Wish" in my car I find myself breaking speed limits.

Right Where It Belongs--And then there are times I like calming down. The final track off With Teeth, this slow and melancholy melody paired with lyrics describing lonely emptiness. It's the sort of song that asks you to question your reality: "What if all the world's inside of your head/just creations of your own? Your devils and your gods/all the living and the dead/and you really are alone?"

I started listening to this song during a point of depression in my life, and found the lyrics really hitting home. There was a point in the song which asks: "If you look at your reflection, is that all you want it to be?" And I had to say "No. No it isn't." and then worked to change my life around. Heady stuff.

The Hand That Feeds--Also off With Teeth, this is one of NIN's more political songs. It's something of a departure from the normal songs of personal angst and turmoil. "What if this whole crusade's/a charade/and behind it all there's a price to be paid/for the blood/on which we've dined/justified in the name of the holy and the divine?" it asks, and I find that's a good question.

However, I like this song not only for its own merits, but for the fact that this was a song that Trent Reznor actually encouraged others to mess with and remix. NIN is one of the few bands that actually encourages fans to take their music and mess with it. At a time where Metallica was throwing hissy fits over P2P filesharing of their album, NIN was busy encouraging fans to remix their music into unrecognizability, and I like supporting bands that are secure enough in their talent that they can let others tinker with their work.

Zero-Sum--This is the final track off of the Year Zero album, a concept album that depicts the final days of a dystopian America under a fascist government. The song depicts the moment when it is clear that it's all over, as heralds of some sort of divine race descend to save the world from the humans who have messed things up so badly. It's a bleak piece of music, to be sure, but there's a sort of tragic loveliness to it as it proceeds.

The Four Of Us Are Dying--This instrumental track is far and away my favorite tunes from NIN's new album, The Slip. As I mentioned before, there are two reasons I listen to NIN. This is one of the tracks that I listen to to calm down from a hard day. The tune swims and weaves--it reminds me of "The Downward Spiral" from the album of the same name.

I found out through Wikipedia that the title came from an old Twilight Zone episode, about a shapeshifter who is slowly dying of a wound and has his face transforming into all the people he's impersonated as he dies. I have no idea if that's what NIN was going for with the reference, but it's a cool image to picture as the track plays.

The Day The World Went Away--This one tends to hit you below the belt. It's a jagged track that is slower and less angry than songs that had come before, but it also feels very personal. This was a single off The Fragile album, which is, depending on who you listen to, either the moment NIN began to break free and explore their range, or the moment NIN began to royally suck. I tend to be in the former category. The song is mostly instrumental, like many other tracks off this album, and the music sounds a lot like depression turned into music.

Hurt--The song made famous first by NIN, then by Johnny Cash, this is the last track from The Downward Spiral (There's a pattern here). The song depicts the end of the downward spiral of the album's protagonist, as his ghost reflects on his life after he's committed suicide. That's the official version, anyway--the lyrics are very open to interpretation, which is probably why it has such a broad appeal. NIN's music tends to bounce between manic and depressive, sometimes within the same song. "Hurt" is solidly on the depressive side of the scale.

Burn--This tune is one of the few I heard first as a cover. I picked up "A Gothic Acoustic Tribute to Nine inch Nails", which was exactly what it says on the tin: a group of NIN covers done with acoustic instruments. One song, "Burn", I had never heard before, but I liked it immediately. It took some doing, but I finally tracked down the original. As it turns out, this was one of the songs on the "Natural Born Killers" soundtrack, and, like "The Perfect Drug", never released on one of NIN's offical albums. Very worthwhile to track down.

So there you have it. You may have noticed that I've avoided most of the singles released via radio--while I like those tracks fine, there was something in each of these that struck me somehow. Now you have a guide to the best of NIN--go forth and listen for yourselves!