Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross have been residing double lives for whereas now. Ever for the reason that duo composed the rating for David Fincher’s The Social Community in 2010, they rapidly grew to become two of essentially the most in-demand musicians in Hollywood and TV – accompanying all the things from Ken Burns and Lynn Novick’s PBS documentary Vietnam to the extra inconceivable likes of Disney-Pixar’s Soul. Parallel to this, after all, has been 9 Inch Nails’ storied musical legacy persevering with to dwell (T)rent-free within the minds of youthful musicians.
Latest years have seen their affect turn into so pervasive we’ve had 5 Seconds Of Summer season pay homage and Miley Cyrus overlaying Head Like A Gap. Halsey even recruited Trent and Atticus to supply the wonderful If I Can’t Have Love, I Need Energy.
What’s so thrilling proper now, nevertheless, is that these twin lives are lastly converging as TRON: Ares pulls the double shift of all double-shifts. Right here now we have a soundtrack to a blockbuster film and the primary new 9 Inch Nails album in 5 years all rolled into one. No strain.
Lead single As Alive As You Want Me To Be – certainly one of 4 songs to function Trent’s singing – served as a superb declaration of intent. A world aside from the place NIN left off with 2020’s Ghosts VI: Locusts instrumental file and, say, the attractive orchestration of 2024’s Queer soundtrack, it’s a digital firestorm of a music. Equally spectacular is simply how simply its lyrics dialling into TRON: Ares’ plot strands regarding synthetic life match into the broader NIN canon of alienation.
Astounding moments like this pile up. Goal Recognized’s stalking instrumental is a masterclass in tension-mounting dread, whereas A Query Of Belief would be the excellent soundtrack to your subsequent journey to the native fetish membership. Even whenever you assume they is perhaps about to make a misstep when Infiltrator begins a bit too upbeat, some low-end pulsing synth throbs re-set the music’s coordinates squarely again to terror city.