Nine Inch Nails: Tron: Ares (2025)

Tron: Ares. Music by Nine Inch Nails (2025)

I realised after making the Hesitation Marks (2013) post that I didn't want any of the really crap Nine Inch Nails releases on my main blog. That meant I didn't write anything about Not The Actual Events (2016), Add Violence (2017), Bad Witch (2018), or Ghosts V + VI (2020), all of which made me sigh for having dared hope they might take NIN back to its former glory.

Tron: Ares' first single, As Alive as You Need Me to Be, had a definite Fragile (1999) / With Teeth (2005) vibe, which gave me hope once again... but the end result was the same. I hoped. I bought. I sighed. [1]

But mostly I'm confused about why it even has the NIN moniker. With just a few exceptions, including As Alive as You Need Me to Be, it resembles a typical Reznor + Ross film score, which for me is something best summed up as lifeless, dull, musical enervation.

Deep | Mlehst ‎/ Split Tape (1996)

Deep | Mlehst ‎/ Split Tape (1996)

The term 'tape-trading' acquired negative connotations due to the volume of (mostly crap-sounding) bootleg live recordings that made the rounds that way, but it was a perfectly viable method for small or independent labels and/or unsigned bands and artists to distribute demos and limited-run releases to interested parties.

It was through such channels that I bought Split Tape in '96. Only 333 official copies exist, but you can find it from time to time on places like Discogs or eBay.

Both artists play a kind of ambient/electronica with an industrial and experimental vibe. 01. The Deep track(s) in particular are a fine example of a hypnotic exchange given the time to grow from an idea into an all-encompassing mood, occasionally reminiscent of Tribes of Neurot. 02. Mlehst is noisier, less rhythmic, with two bass guitars, a drum machine, loops and samples.

I ripped the cassette to digital files many years ago for use in my mp3 player. You can find a DL link for both below the cut. [1]

DUNE 2000: PS1 Music (Game Rip)

DUNE 2000  ☆  PS1 Music (Game Rip)

Kate Bush: Studio Albums Cover Art (1978—)

Kate Bush: Studio Albums Cover Art (1978-2011)

W.A.S.P. - Reidolized - The Film (2018)

W.A.S.P. - Reidolized

(The Soundtrack to The Crimson Idol)

Dir. Ralph Ziman

Even though I'll be referring to the album itself, the text below is primarily for the sixty-minute 'film' that accompanied W.A.S.P.'s re-recording of their fifth studio album, The Crimson Idol, which was originally released back in 1992. If ever I do a band discography post I'll give the new version of the album the kudos it deserves.

The 'film' is the album's songs with occasional v/o narration by vocalist Blackie Lawless; i.e., parts of The Story of Jonathan (Prologue to the Crimson Idol) track that was included on the 1998 remaster of the 1992 concept album.

Documenting the tragic rise and fall of a fictional rock star named Jonathan Aaron Steele, and incorporating such themes as abandonment, emotional need, addiction, ambition and, ultimately, self-worth, it's presented in grainy lo-fi B+W with frequent splashes of symbolic crimson. It's a conceptually interesting idea that nevertheless gets tiresome pretty quickly.