Many bands struggle to make a great album but eventually release their masterpiece. Many others start strong with an excellent, maybe even classic, album and peter out afterwards. Nine Inch Nails is one of the few rock acts that lays claim to a classic debut followed by further classics. The odd thing is that Pretty Hate Machine had Trent Reznor introducing us to a NIN sound that was quite different than what was to follow. This album is less experimental - though still quite innovative - and much more listener friendly.

Pretty Hate Machine opens with one of the most well known Nine Inch Nails songs: Head Like a Hole. Unmistakable electronic beats drive this bitter railing directed at the selfish wealthy: "God Money, let's go dancing on the backs of the bruised." Reznor's restrained verses explode into a chorus so forceful you will not forget his hatred for the greedy: "Head like a hole/ Black as your soul/ I'd rather die/ Than give you control."

This is immediately followed by another NIN heavy hitter called Terrible Lie. This track follows in the style of its predecessor with excellent industrial beats and pure vitriol in Reznor's voice. When he sneers out, "I think you owe me a great, big apology," you know he means it with every fiber of his being. Another highlight of Pretty Hate Machine is different than most NIN songs. With lines like "Gray would be the color if I had a heart," Something I Can Never Have is a brilliantly haunting and stirring track. It's an outpouring of emotion that comes very close to Hurt in terms of the band's most beautifully tortured tracks.

It won't take long to realize that Pretty Hate Machine is by far the most accessible NIN album to date. The heavy guitars, brutal screams, and overall abrasiveness of later albums have yet to appear here. Instead, Reznor's focus is on rocking to electronic beats. Every track is listener-friendly without venturing into poppiness. He even manages to do semi-rap on Down In It and somehow make it fit in with the rest of the album.

While there are tons of excellent, darkly poetic lyrics on this album, many of them are surprisingly atypical of this band. A great deal of this album focuses on lost love in an almost teen-angst way ... without being juvenile, of course. Lines from That's What I Get such as "Just when everything was making sense/ You took away all my self-confidence" and "I'm slipping on the tears you made me cry" don't seem very Reznor-like, but the dark music and powerful vocals remind us that this is most certainly Nine Inch Nails. More lost love lyrics appear in Sanctified, but the song's cavernous sound makes this one more eerie than sappy.

Two of the album's lesser known heavy hitters appear toward the end. Sin rocks pretty hard with a choppy but catchy chorus. Ringfinger is a strong album closer. It's one of the more accessible tracks with slow verses and a catchy chorus, but the grinding electric guitar sound, more familiar in later NIN material, appears to beef up the track before taking us out with a static-like ending (perhaps a sign of what's to come on PHM's follow-up Broken).

Pretty Hate Machine is a tremendous debut from what would become one of the biggest rock bands of the '90s. This album not only ushered in the "industrial" genre, but it also set Trent Reznor on the path of becoming one of rock's geniuses. Those who aren't yet into Nine Inch Nails might do well to try out this album before getting into later material. While greater things were to follow, it's still difficult to match the greatness of Pretty Hate Machine.


Also from Nine Inch Nails:

Broken
The Downward Spiral
With Teeth
Year Zero
Ghosts I-IV



Recommended: Yes