(31 Dec 2010)
Remember when Nine Inch Nails were considered great and angsty teenagers considered The Downward Spiral a magnum opus? I don't, but let's assume that that's the case. After all, they were pretty big during the 90s. Well, you probably know they released one excellent album and one good, yet extremely overrated one. Now, fast-forward to 2008. Forget that the 8 years between this and The Fragile ever existed, because, in case you haven't heard With Teeth, Year Zero or Ghosts, you haven't missed much at all.
The Slip was completed in about two months and was released completely for free. In other words, this album follows a recipe for certain failure. And it fails: it fails to fail. In fact, it fails so hard at failing, that it is, in my humble opinion, among the best albums this house name of industrial-rock-turned-joke-of-itself has churned out so far. Believe me, it is up there with the likes of The Fragile and The Downward Spiral.
The Slip is very interesting in the way that, on first listens, this will mostly sound like a poppy, superficial album, that is enjoyable a few times and then grows old, but you listen to it time and again, and it DOES NOT AGE. It's certainly not as intense or "sophisticated" as the 90s material, but it is definitely as inspired. It's also probably his most human album to date. It is flawed, but it works past its flaws. It's music just for the music. It doesn't try to appeal. It just does. Also, it flows extremely well.
This is a simple, humble release. It is not actually underrated, because, if you compare it to other Nine Inch Nails albums, it seems sloppy and unfocused. But this album is not part of the older material, apart from maybe Year Zero. The Slip stands alone. It is not NIN, just Trent Reznor.
Standout tracks:
1,000,000
Letting You
Head Down
Corona Radiata
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