Skip to main content

NIN - Year Zero

Now I suppose there is a view among some NIN fans that the last album White Teeth was a bit too mainstream Rock and not enough industrial/electronic sounding and true NIN-like (indeed the recent live set's lack of material from this record may reflect that). Personally I thought/think that White Teeth is a good record, but then I like to Rawk!. But, I digress

We now have Year Zero, the first of what is rumoured to be part one of a two-piece concept album release. Lyrically Trent has Re-imagining the US as a police state in 15 years

Musically we are back in the very electronic realm. Lyrically it's the usual Trent mixture of good and bad."I pushed the button and elected him to office/He pushed the button and he dropped the bomb" (Capital G)

The album kicks off with brief instrumental "Hyperpower!" which moves nicely into the slow-building "The Beginning of the End" (one of the album's best songs) before rushing headlong into lead single "Survivalism". Much depression and misery follow - as you'd expect.

I don't believe I am about to say this, but this could actually be Trent's finest hour. For me this album contains far less filler than any previous outing.

Album's highlights for me are: "Violent Heart", "Great Destroyer", "Capital G", "Me, I'm Not", "In this Twilight" and "The Beginning of the End"

Certain to feature in many 'best of' year polls. A great album.

*****
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Substack: the new blogging and a new music newsletter

  Hello again my old blogger blog. Just checking in to plug the new substack newsletter I'm doing. It is also home to the CTTB Music podcast and its archive too. Why not pay me a visit and sign up for future editions of the newsletter (free) 
Post a Comment
Read more

The Decemberists - 'The Hazards of Love'

Whilst the Decemberists have been around for a number of years, and a friend of mine is a big fan, I have to confess - a few tunes aside - they have never really made much of a splash with me. With their fifth album - 'The Hazards of Love' - a 17-track concept album that sort of tells a story about a fair maiden ravished by a shape-shifting demon (no, really) - however, I am suddenly find myself surprisingly won over. On some levels - like most concept albums - it is utter tosh, but with its repeating musical motifs and reprises, making you quickly think that actually there are only about five actual songs on the album - a clever trick. Like with all good concept albums this makes listening on shuffle not the ideal way to digest this album - especially as their are short 'interlude' pieces joining all the songs too. Added to all this the fact that the band seem to have a love for early 70's British folk/prog/heavy metal and this walks right up my street - and will ...
6 comments
Read more
To be honest, I don’t think 2010 will be remembered as a ‘great’ year music-wise, although some good stuff did get released. It was a year when the hip and happening people told me I should be listening to Tame Impala, Gold Panda, Deerhunter, Beach House and others. And, I did. All were perfectly fine, but none really grabbed me, and I can’t help feeling that tame Impala sounded much better in the context of a Soundtrack album than they did on a full album of their own. So leaving those aside, was there one album that stood head and shoulders above all else this year? Not for me. There were several albums that held my attention at different parts of the year but only a few which didn’t fall away, and less still that made last gasp dashes to improve with time. So, what follows are 20 albums I have enjoyed for various reasons during 2010. If I were doing it another week, maybe O Children, She and Him, Warpaint, Pull in Emergency, Thea Gilmore, Mary Chapin Carpenter, and Liz Phair may hav...
3 comments
Read more