LISTEN: Nine Inch Nails - Hesitation Marks [2013]

With sprawling electro-fist pumpers strewn across an eclectic eighth album, Nine Inch Nails have returned with Hesitation Marks on the latter eve of first single Come Back Haunted. A taster, if you will, back then of what to expect from Trent Reznor's industrial tour-de-force. It would be naive to suggest that Reznor is the only driving member of the band but here again, as made evident from 2008's The Slip, each individual has a part to play. This album is meant to be played loud. Nine Inch Nails, similar to Tool, want you to not just listen, but feel the very strength behind their works.

Copy Of A opens the album proper, a harrowing death verse from the perspective of a patsy or the perspective of a drone warped by today's black hole trends and three-month social calendar reset, or both. When listening to lengthier songs, my attention may wane if the repetition or the story loses my interest, but the length of the tracks on Hesitation Marks did not falter my gauging of the industrial tech-pop that raged from here. The great thing about Nine Inch Nails is the instrumental quality never loses itself and the sounds you hear create an atmosphere that is reminiscent of early Massive Attack. This is evidenced in Find My Way, intermittently hinted with what could be a tape deck or a gun loading bookended with a harmonic life support blip.

Other stand out tracks that raise hands for a more clubbed out remix include All Time Low, which rang a familiar echo of With Teeth's Only, Satellite, Running and techno stomper I Would For You. The album's title refers to the marks made with a bladed weapon before the attempt of suicide. Hesitation Marks explores several facets of the carnal and morbid fascination of giving up in a world that feels frighteningly unreal now. With Teeth felt like the band's dicing with conspiracy theories, Year Zero portrayed an elevation of the senses through to a deeper understanding, The Slip akin to 10,000 Days by Tool was a very back down to earth journey and Hesitation Marks signifies the band's acceptance and will to defeat the walls that close in around them. This makes sense when you realise that this is Reznor and Atticus Ross' fourth collaboration as co-producers and/or co-writers.

In Two throws screaming missiles at the eardrums sandwiched in Reznor's soothing quiets and harkening vocals powering to a crescendo powered by Alessandro Cortini and Robin Finck, before grinding to a sudden immediate halt. While I'm Still Here marks a very minimalist turn for the band, electronic throughout with the slight hint of hammer-ons and slides. Black Noise is the album's closer and epilogue to While I'm Still Here, pulling you down a never-ending wind tunnel mirroring the disfigured opening The Eater Of Dreams. You can still hear the beats and rhythm but just barely over the sonic frightmare-inducing collapse of the world around you.

Not quite a champion effort but certainly a majestic display of the band's unfaltering quality and unchanging insistence. That being said, the soundwork here would not be lost in years to come as they seem to effortlessly destroy other bands' achingly disappointing releases as they try to contend with the genre's unsettling changes to match the more popularised talent shows out there.