Nine Inch Nails frontman Trent Reznor is probably someone you’re familiar with, whether you know it or not. When he isn’t making music with Nine Inch Nails, he’s composing soundtracks (some of which he’s won Oscars for) with his bandmate, Atticus Ross, for films like “The Social Network,” “Soul,” and this year’s “Challengers.” However, back in the 90s, before he was making soundtracks for movies, he came up with the idea for “The Downward Spiral,” a concept album centered around a man falling further and further into depravity and self destruction.
The album begins with the aptly named “Mr. Self Destruct.” From the get-go, this album lets you know exactly what kind of sounds you’re about to be exposed to for the next hour. The slow drums that begin to accelerate pull you in before a wildly distorted guitar floods in. The instrumentation is so oppressive and overwhelming that it can be hard to figure out what instrument is playing what part. The guitar and drums are easy to hear, but the other noises sound like loud machinery, almost as if the band recorded the sounds from a factory floor and used that as the background for their song. Trent Reznor’s lyrics for this song are written from the perspective of “Mr. Self Destruct,” which represents the voice in his head that leads to his self-destructive behavior shown all throughout the album. After the first verse where Mr. Self Destruct explains that he is “the voice inside your head” and “the hate you try to hide,” you’re thrown right into the chorus where it sounds like the guitar and Reznor are fighting for control over the song. When I play this in my car, it sounds like it’s actively ripping my speakers apart, no matter how loud it is.
“Heresy” sounds incredibly industrial like “Mr. Self Destruct,” but it’s a much lighter song by comparison. For most of the song, Reznor sings in a bizarre, almost creepy falsetto over a low buzzing synth and a simple one-two drum pattern, until the first chorus, when he drops the falsetto in favor of screaming over a guitar so distorted it sounds like a wall of sound. After the first chorus, the aggression never leaves the song with the guitar remaining present in the subsequent verses. Lyrically, this song shows the main character becoming increasingly disillusioned with religion, specifically Christianity, citing all the suffering in the world for the reason God can’t exist.
The following song, “March Of The Pigs,” is one of the most disorienting on the album with its wonky ¼ time signature and fast-paced drums. As more elements are layered in – like vocals and screaming riffs – the song becomes harder to follow until everything cuts out and Reznor trades his screaming for singing. The only instrument he’s left with is a piano, and once he’s finished, the song just goes silent for a couple seconds until everything floods back in. If you don’t know what’s coming, it can genuinely feel like a jump scare.
“Closer” is one of the more popular songs on this album, and for good reason. Electric pulsing drums and constant hi-hats paired with Reznor taking a more singerly approach rather than the guttural screaming he’s utilized up to this point make this song pretty catchy. The lyrical content delves into Reznor’s sexual experiences and how they get him closer to God. This can be interpreted two different ways, with his experiences metaphorically getting him closer to God through pleasure or the abuse of his relationship pushing him towards suicide, which would get him literally closer to God.
The second-to-last song and title track of the album don’t do much in terms of musicality, but it does push the story to a close with the protagonist’s self-destructive actions throughout the album resulting in him deciding that suicide is the only way out. “Problems do have solutions, you know. A lifetime of f***ing things up fixed in one determined flash.” Most lyrics are delivered softly in a spoken word style over an aggressive instrumental that sounds like it’s been submerged under water. As the song ends, the instrumental becomes louder until it completely drowns out Reznor.
The 14th and final track, “Hurt,” is sonically one of the quietest and slowest tracks on the entire album, but it still features aspects that make it rough on the ears. The acoustic guitar is completely intact, but there’s heavily distorted white noise that is just as loud as everything else. This song features some of Reznor’s most reserved vocals, with him either whispering or actually singing rather than screaming. In the second half of the song, his vocals are so quiet and shaky that it almost sounds like he’s on the verge of crying– until the drums come back in and proceed to try and drown everything out.
Lyrically, the song acts as an epilogue, with the main protagonist reflecting on his destructive behaviors. I’ve seen people online interpret this song in two different ways: Either the protagonist surviving his suicide attempt and coming to terms with his unhealthy coping mechanisms, or reflecting on his drug addiction as he attempts to recover from it. I interpret it as a mixture of both, with the protagonist surviving his suicide attempt, reflecting on his drug addiction and coming to terms with the fact that though he’d like to change, he might be too far gone to do so.
In the first verse, he sings about how his suicide attempt was a test to see if he still feels pain and how the pain he feels is the only real thing in his life. In the next few lines, he sings about his heroin addiction. He mentions a needle tearing a hole and how that brings “the old familiar sting.” In the next two lines he says, “Try to kill it all away, but I remember everything.” I interpret this as the protagonist “killing” his depression through either suicide or heroin, neither of which work as he survived his suicide attempt, and the heroin no longer seems to work as a coping mechanism. During the chorus, the protagonist sings about how he has nothing now. All of his friends and family have grown, changed and eventually left him. He attributes everything he is left with to an empire of dirt, which is startlingly clever lyricism. Firstly there’s the obvious interpretation being that his “empire” is as worthless as dirt, but his “empire” could also be one of drugs and addiction, as dirt is another name for heroin.
“The Downward Spiral” was released to both critical and commercial acclaim, though it didn’t come without its fair share of controversy due to its dark subjects. During a hearing on the marketing and distribution practices of violent content to minors, the band would stand accused of indirectly inspiring the Columbine shooting due to several references to the album within Dylan Klebold, one of the shooters’ journals. Most politicians drawing the link pointed to the violent lyrics of the ninth song on the album, “Big Man with a Gun,” despite the song itself satirizing the glorification of violence in “gangsta rap” and other adjacent genres at the time.
Despite its controversy, “The Downward Spiral” left its stamp on pop-culture and is nowadays regarded as one of the most important albums of the 90s by publications like Rolling Stone and Sterogum. It has withstood the test of time by being one of the most well realized concept albums ever. Decades later the effects of this album can still be felt whether it be from other artists drawing influence or from Reznor and Ross becoming A-list movie composers, something that might not have happened had this album not launched the band and Reznor to stardom.
