Nine Inch Nails Music:

Year Zero Track Listing:
1. Hyperpower!
2. Beginning of the End
3. Survivalism
4. Good Soldier
5. Vessel
6. Me, I'm Not
7. Capital G
8. My Violent Heart
9. Warning
10. God Given
11. Meet Your Master
12. Greater Good
13. Great Destroyer
14. Another Version of the Truth
15. In This Twilight
16. Zero-Sum

Editorial Review:
Japanese pressing of the 2007 album from Trent Reznor and friends. This is Part One of a two-part concept album set some 15 years in the future and is a vision of that future, a cautionary tale of a world we could be living in if current world events stay on the path we are set on. 16 tracks including the first single 'Survivalism'. Universal.

Description of Year Zero:
Nine Inch Nails' sixth studio release, Year Zero takes the concept album further than it may have ever gone before. In advance of its release, URLs were hidden in tour t-shirts, music- and image-filled USB drives were 'found' at concerts, and dozens of websites have been packed with conspiracy stories that all involve the year 2022 or 'Year Zero.' Each clue is part of a cohesive whole, requiring a listener to follow an exhaustive web trail to grasp the entire tale. Focusing specifically on the music, "The Beginning of the End," the powerful first vocal track, is like the sonic and lyrical equivalent of an emotional ascension to a rollercoaster's peak, with the last few cacophonic seconds equaling the fall of individual freedoms. "Survivalism," Year Zero's first single, follows with guest vocalist/Slam artist Saul Williams pumping up the passion in its urgent chorus. While still industrial in genre, it's clear that Trent Reznor's musical evolution finds him bringing more mellow songs to the mix than he has on previous discs ("The Good Soldier," "The Greater Good," "In This Twilight") as well as an increased number of funk-affected rhythms, specifically in standout tracks "Capitol G" and "Me, I'm Not." Devotees of NIN's harder sound will appreciate the metallic crunch of "My Violent Heart" and "Meet Your Master." On the whole, the Nine Inch Nails we hear on Year Zero is less focused on producing heavy music and more focused on delivering its heavy, conspiratorial doomsday message. --Denise Sheppard

Year Zero Reviews:
Always in Love with Nine Inch Nails!
2009-12-12 - Certainly enhances my collection and always a joy to listen to the best band in tecno-industrial-metal or whatever the most popular catch phrase is now- don't go without this CD, and get the entire Nine Inch Nails Halo Collection of music. Trent Reznor is the BEST!

Good, but Different
2009-10-03 - i will admit i was dissapointed with this at first, but it grew on me. i am one insane NIN fan. i have been trying to collect everything by them!but anyway this album is OK for the most part. different but still good.

2007 Nine Inch Nails CD
2009-09-24 - Good record, interesting sounds, unusual songs as well. Sort of more raw sounding than the With Teeth record. All in all, a record worth checking out if you like NIN, or even if you don't.

Disappointing
2009-09-03 - I always try to take glowing reviews with a grain of salt, but every previous NIN album has been good enough (and With Teeth, carrying alot of production value) that I took it on faith that this album would be a "masterpiece". Well, it's not. The lack of live instruments leave the whole work sounding flat. I tried to listen to it straight through but found myself getting bored and skipping the last minute of several tracks. There's certainly some cool rhythms here, and I suspect it would be much more engrossing live or at least played loud in a large room that's alive, but on headphones it's nothing special. I'll give the remixed release a shot since the big empty spaces in this album seem to need something.

Zero Impulse Control
2009-07-12 - I once heard that a good artist is everywhere in their art, but seen nowhere. This is why Year Zero is by far Trent Reznor's worst album. I'm simply bewildered by the positive reviews, by fans and critics (although Rolling Stone has a record of "bad call" reviews, praising junk and bashing what becomes classics). None of them have convinced me otherwise; the Angst Emperor wears no clothes.

In almost every corner of this album, you can hear Trent trying. Not being as he was with all of his previous albums, but trying. Skipping through each forgettable track, you can actually see him sitting at the computer, trying this or that beat or sound with this or that rhythm, topped off with "concept" protest lyrics. You know, the Bush is Teh Evil, Greedy Capitalistz, OMG Religulous Right themes as already done by Pearl Jam, Radiohead, Neil Young, Green Day and virtually every punk band existing in 2004.

I just never thought he would be this typical. Year Zero Effort comes from the same man who did Downward Spiral, Fragile, Broken, and Pretty Hate Machine. For each, the electronic hooks were only artistic tools of industrial rock brilliance, with powerful lyrics that cut into one's emotions in a way nothing else did. They were quality over quantity, as he took the time to develop each song. This one is full of digital whims and impulses conveyed as a serious yet artsy analysis of society and government that just ends up as one big iMess.

Okay, specifics. [Track X] is just beat, loop, beat with melodramatic lyrics. [Track Y] has this crazy digital stuff and a thinly-veiled rant about Bush. [Track Z] is okay because it has a few seconds of pretty piano, but otherwise is just some noises and beats on repeat.

On the positive side, the heat-sensitive disc is fun to play with (but I just had to sell it after about three listens). Okay, fine...Hyperpower starts interesting, Survivalism is infectious, My Violent Heart is kinda cool, In This Twilight has a good atmosphere, and Zero Sum has a decent chorus. So I guess I can't quite give it Year Zero Stars.

Ghosts and Slip more or less fell into the same artistic hole, but at least they were improvements. Ghosts wasn't trying to be Genius Creative Protest Album v58.0 and Slip didn't sound like it was thrown together on an Apple in a week. Please Trent, remember what you are.