Anyone familiar with the work of Trent Reznor will recognise the cover art style on Hesitation Marks. Nine Inch Nails' new album marks the return of Russell Mills, who designed the visual art for The Downward Spiral nineteen years ago. Hesitation Marks is the first Nine Inch Nails album in five years; the previous release being the utterly disappointing The Slip, released for free over the band’s website.
The first single from Hesitation Marks was released a while ago, and was an encouraging track called Came Back Haunted, a strong track with a dark, thick, pulsating electronic-industrial base which would put Skrillex to shame. Despite the incredibly glib title, Came Back Haunted is a great song incorporating a rich, dark , techno bassline, and thick synthesizers creating an invigorating and tense atmosphere and texture, marking a potential return to form for NIN. It also features very well incorporated guitars, with that eerie distortion Reznor developed so very well on The Fragile, resulting in a great sense of mild dissonance, as well as providing an organic and dynamic contrast to the predominantly digital and electronic track. This is what Nine Inch Nails is famous for.
I wanted to have this review out last week, but unfortunately I was unable to obtain Hesitation Marks until last Thursday, and I needed to listen to it more carefully to understand my own opinion. I listened to this album over and over, and I still couldn’t figure out whether I liked it or not, and by how much. My first impression was simply of disappointment - as far as I could tell, it was barely superior to a generic pop album. I spent much of my first listen waiting for the powerful, defining moment that never came. However, the more I listened, I noticed subtleties and nuances which I had missed earlier, which changed my opinion somewhat; however, it didn’t help me to enjoy listening to it, and it took me a fair while to figure out why.
There are quite a few reasons why this album is sub-par, but they mostly boil down to one simple fact: Hesitation Marks does not sound like a Nine Inch Nails album. Trent Reznor is undoubtedly at his best when dealing with dissonance, tension, and a certain harshness, from a musical standpoint. In his ventures into radio-friendly, unchallenging pop music he tends to stumble quite spectacularly; one quite prominent example we have already seen is Every Day Is Exactly The Same, from the With Teeth album. Hesitation Marks is very much on the same level as that song. Although the tense, semi-quaver percussive synth still makes its occasional appearance (somewhat of a signature of Reznor’s musical style), the strong metallic drums that Nine Inch Nails have used to great effect in the past are conspicuously absent, as well as many other commendable aspects of NIN’s music, in favour of a clean, neat, polished electronica-pop sound. Reznor has abandoned many stylistic aspects which have defined NIN over the years, and opted for a flat, dull, and unambitious result.
I’m not about to make the common - and fallacious - argument that “it’s different, therefore it sucks.” It is important for artists change and evolve over time, as well as explore new territory, rather than stagnate to appeal to a disturbingly loyal fanbase (incidentally, I liked With Teeth a lot). There are times, however, when a band or artist changes their music in such a way that renders it considerably worse than their previous releases. This generally happens when bands dumb down their music by watering down the complexity and subtlety into a more simple, straightforward, and overall unimaginative effort, and the individual character of the band begins to decay as they become merely a shadow of their former selves. Essentially, this results in music somewhat similar to their earlier music, minus a certain level of substance - in other words, they add nothing and remove quite a bit.
This is not an evolution of styles, nor is it a band or artist exploring new ground or experimenting with new styles. This is more comparable to an artist running out of ideas. I can name several examples: Nick Cave’s latest album, Evanescence’s latest album, Metallica’s latest album, Muse’s latest album, and Radiohead’s In Rainbows, as a brief list. However, a more relevant example would be NIN’s own The Slip, a dull, unoriginal, and uninteresting album quite rightly given away for free. The fact is, just because it was made by Nine Inch Nails, does not necessarily mean it will be good, and this fact will not change no matter how much of a die-hard NIN fan you are.
Hesitation Marks, at times, borders on this condition. It often sounds similar to a cross between The Fragile and With Teeth, but with less unique character and complexity than either of them., and is therefore inferior to both. It doesn’t add enough new to Nine Inch Nails as an identity, and at the same time lacks many former attributes of NIN’s music.
I listened to With Teeth again this week, for the sake of comparison, and I noticed a couple of things. The first, and most prominent aspect, was the drums - specifically, With Teeth utilises a fair amount of strong, hard drumming and an organic drum track, which creates a powerful feel to the album. Hesitation Marks, by contrast, uses almost the exact opposite; true to its electronic form, the drum tracks used on Hesitation Marks are artificial, over-polished, stifled, restrained, and most of all, inorganic. The snare drum, in particular, is most of the time an underwhelming “tap” rather than the “crash” in many of NIN’s older albums. It makes the entire album sound very weak overall. Previous NIN works have used similar drum tracks - Even Deeper comes to mind - but that particular song, for example, has a very thick and eerie atmospheric quality, something lacking from much of this album.
In addition to the drums, another negative aspect which took me a few listens to pick up on was the vocals. Trent Reznor’s vocals on this album are only indicative of a much larger problem, but his voice exacerbates it, and that problem is that Hesitation Marks sounds like a pop album. To be more precise, electronica-pop. I already mentioned Reznor is at his worst when trying to be clean and radio-friendly, and on this album his voice is possibly the worst offender. Less emphasis is on the passionate and intense delivery we have previously heard, and more on pitch and intonation. It sounds fake and insincere - he even goes so far as to use Autotune on one song (Copy Of A). There is probably a case to be made for it being ironic, but that doesn’t change the fact that it sounds terrible.
Although there are subtle aspects that I did miss on my first listen, overall this album lacks subtlety. Subtlety regarding more complex arrangements, such as dynamics, layering, and syncopation are absent. There’s very little thought given to the development of ideas; everything is laid on the table at face value. Little use of dynamic variability makes the entire album appear very flat, and therefore fails to engage the listener. - very much like pop music. The opening song, Copy Of A, is a prime example - rather than rise and fall with variable force and volume, it is carried by a repetitive, thin drum beat. There’s no depth to the music, an aspect partially attributable to the layering. Rather than being intricate, for example, the layering is more strewn all over the place, making the music appear complex, but in actuality is just messy. At this stage, I have to mention the song Everything, because it is terrible. It sounds like all the worst songs by The Cure rolled into one , as well as being completely stylistically out of place with absolutely no solidarity with the rest of the album.
But, as in many cases, Hesitation Marks contains some prominent exceptions. There are some decent guitar passages on quite a few songs on this album, reminiscent of the uniquely subtle guitar work on The Fragile. Songs such as Copy Of A, and Disappointed use this technique to great effect at times, creating a sense of eerie dissonance in the music and the quirky riff on All Time Low deserves commendation for being a very interesting listen. However, this phenomenon is possibly most evident on the song Satellite. This song deserves special mention for being based on a pop beat that would disappoint Beyoncé - but the guitar track comes in out of left field and creates an unprecedented level of tension and atmosphere to the song. Unfortunately, it comes and goes faster than you can say “this sounds cool”, and goes straight back into the boring pop sound. If it had focussed more on that guitar, it could have been something great - this is also applicable to all the above mentioned songs.
There are also some genuinely enjoyable songs here - Came Back Haunted, obviously, but also In Two, an eclectic and challenging song with subversive layering, some fascinating synthesizers, and an interesting, syncopated beat. Another song I enjoyed, strangely enough, is Various Methods Of Escape, which despite qualifying for pop-rock, is a very balanced song, with a moderate tempo and an interesting melodic progression, especially in the chorus, which I still enjoy listening to - the heavy drums at the end also round off the song very nicely. The final instrumental track is also outstanding, reminiscent of Reznor’s tremendous film score work.
But Hesitation Marks is, overall, a half-baked effort. Gone are the forceful drums, the powerful and emotionally charged singing, the atmospheric tension and the unpredictable dynamcs, and with them goes the solidarity and strength of the music. And it all points to a simple fact: Hesitation Marks did not come from Trent Reznor’s heart. It has no real conviction or drive, and it shows. There just wasn’t enough effort put into writing this album, and making it the best it could be - it is as though Reznor didn’t care enough about what he was making, and was happy to sell a sub-par album. It sounds contrived, unnatural, stifled, and artificial. This sounds more like an inconsequential side project than anything else - and on top of that, NIN is beginning to sound more and more like Radiohead post-2003, which is not necessarily a good thing at all.
I know Trent is better than this. He is an incredibly talented composer, and has shown it time and time again in the last two decades. Hesitation Marks has enough solid ideas for a great EP; however it is padded to the brim with extra mediocre filling, and while it does have its standout points, unfortunately the album must be judged as a whole. It appears to have been something he decided to throw together noncommittally, with the good ideas accidentally manifesting within all the mediocrity. This album doesn’t have enough substance or strength to support it, and overall sounds more like a slapdash effort.
Having said this, there is enough complexity for me to listen to it several times and still struggle to come to any definite conclusion, and there’s enough variety to ensure there is a lot to talk about, however it’s not enough. There’s practically nothing in this album that you couldn’t get from listening to an older NIN album, and at that, it’s simply an inferior replica. The peaks of Hesitation Marks equate to the average song from The Fragile, and it’s disappointing to see NIN stagnate so spectacularly with this latest release.
