blksqul's Full Review: With Teeth [PA] [Digipak] by Nine Inch Nails
Trent Reznor views the world as a soured, curdled place, where the only excitement and beauty is the excitement and beauty he makes himself. He went through the gears of a fractured upbringing in a quiet Midwest town, which no doubt helped influence his viewpoint. That Reznor, now entering his 40s, still hasn't moved through his childhood pain is telling, and explains why that pain has become his artistic juice. His music is personal therapy, his way of trying to gain control of his depressions, and it is as self-indulgent, confused and cathartic as that tag implies.
It's been six years from the muddled "The Fragile" to the also muddled "With Teeth," but the differences in the muddling point to Reznor moving beyond his usual palette of conflicted hedonism, while still reveling in its teen-age, self-destructive power. What we have on this album, then, are some of Reznor's most personal fears reflected back at him, alongside some of his most empty work. It's as though he is unable to tell whether what he's writing entertains new ideas or simply flails in the corner. But he's trying, and he's backed by a crack new band, so we'll give him the benefit of the doubt.
Our confidence is well-placed as the quiet, metronomical "All the Love in the World" comes to life. Backed by subtle mechanical beats, warm piano and a falsetto section full of edged longing, the song seems to open the door to a more reflective NIN era. Lyrically, Reznor is repeating himself, but only to a point. He might be borrowing the images of insects and marching from his most acclaimed album, "The Downward Spiral," but he crafts them into new shapes, letting out conflicted emotions that, while never exactly reaching love, are getting there, slowly. It's a healing track, a salve from the brutal battering that NIN usually cooks up.
Which is why the next track, the kidney punch that is "You Know What You Are?" is so disappointing. It's a wall of anger directed at itself, smothered in a buzzing, noisy whine of guitar and thudding drums. The illusion of a more mature NIN is further shattered by the nothingness of "The Collector." The track is saddled by a bassline that can't tell if it wants to rock out or keep its head down, so does neither, and is further destroyed by lyrics that don't build from their starting point, the idea that someone collects the emotions that people hold onto, probably keeping them polished to a high shine on a shelf in some subterranean den.
Reznor comes back from that misstep with the insta-single "The Hand That Feeds." It's a timid critique of Bush's war -- never really delving into the justified anger that such a war causes -- but what it lacks in specifics, it more than makes up for in chugging hooks and hard-wired pop melodies, Reznor's tossing spider webs over the summer rock radio playlist like he's meant to.
Regaining his confidence, Reznor next hits us with the stunning "Love Is Not Enough." James Bond-ish title aside, the track is honest in its description of the death of feeling for someone else -- its anger is heartbreaking, not put-upon. Hearing it sends the listener (this listener anyway) into a clutter of memories that, with time, becomes all that is left of a shared past. The track bristles with factory beats conspiring to chew off our skin, but the real pain, the track's agonizing sense of loss, comes from the living scream of guitars backing Reznor's deflated taunts. "Now you got anything left to show? No no, I didn't think so."
That pain leads to the world-weary "Every Day is Exactly the Same." Reznor sings this one sweetly, as though he's a little boy again, while his constructed soundscapes percolate around him. The loneliness in this one, each day met with grim resignation, is revealing, and through this glimpse into Reznor's scarred view, we can start to understand why he would choose to hide from the world, inside a studio that his talent and ambition built. Reznor has always had a bit of the loner in him, but never before has it been laid out so plainly, and so piercingly.
"With Teeth" is kinda sexy, but doesn't hold a wax-dripping candle to "Closer." It says nothing new about Reznor's view of sex as a drug, with its disorienting rushes, its obliterating highs, and its cruel hangovers. The song ends up sounding lonely and unfulfilled, a feeling which reaches pathological levels on "Only." There's a lot going on in this disorienting song, Reznor buzzing on all cylinders as though he's latched onto a new method of composition, singing in several different styles, a bit erratic, tossing in references to his debut single at one point to see what sticks. All the shiny spaces in this track can't hide the bleakness of its message: "There is no you/There is only me," solipsism as the ultimate loneliness. It's a lullaby poised to knock us out of the cradle before the bough has a chance to break, a rock song that can't survive the sea it tosses.
"Getting Smaller" has become infamous for its incoherent line "I've got my arms in flip flop flip." Well, the lyrics don't matter. It's much more about the gut-busting, thrashing power of its repeated riff melting all reason into gold teeth, kicking old bones into the gutter. Reznor can barely be heard over the raucous, sour heat of the musical roar blaring around and through him. He might be getting smaller, but his urgency is growing.
"Sunspots" takes a breather from the terrorizing noise, all lust and self-loathing, a churning bass, pop melodies ground into fine ash. Reznor screws the pain away, only to find it returning. While the lyrics add nothing new to his canon, the overall feeling adds more than it takes away. "The Line Begins to Blur," trying to follow "Sunspots'" lead, takes away more than it adds. So we're at a standstill now, our thoughts probably drifting, a little bored.
Which is the best time to hit someone over the head with a surprise. "Beside You in Time" does just that, coming out of nowhere to build a warm glow, which heats into flame, growing into a blaze that turns the sky red, until finally the rain comes to extinguish the ashy mess. It's a soothing and distant landscape that suddenly rushes up to fill your entire vision, going from resignation to highly romantic hope in five minutes -- "I am all alone this time around" somehow becomes "We will never die." There's no map to this mood change, but it can be heard, shifting, curving, in the music. It's the most gorgeous, fragile thing I've yet heard from Nine Inch Nails, and shows that Reznor is pushing himself, however quietly, into something new.
Reznor sends us home with "Right Where It Belongs." It's a quiet, bare bones track, a nearly jaunty piano melody interrupted at one point by a studio trick. The song is about modes of reality, perception, and our inability to separate the two. Though the lyrics suffer from Reznor's dependence on using symbols instead of telling moments from actual life to make their point, the track is still striking. There's an innocent, searching quality to it, which, even while tempered by his cynicism, seems to offer a way out into a world that's a bit brighter than he first made it out to be. His growing pains make for a fascinating listen.
With "With Teeth," Reznor has moved away from his obsession with control. He still gets off on it and its variations -- religion, relationships and drugs as their own S&M -- how they attract and infect, but he is opening himself up more, piece by piece. The door hasn't been thrown wide yet, he's not ready to twist the doorknob, but his hand is on it. You can almost feel the weight of it on this album. Curious. Hopeful. Terrified.
With Teeth, the first album of new material in six years from Nine Inch Nails, proves the band name still carries weight. With Teeth blisters from the...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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