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Hesitation Marks

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Untitled

Hesitation Marks is the eighth studio album by American industrial rock act Nine Inch Nails, released on August 30, 2013. It is their first album since 2008's The Slip, and first release on Columbia Records, making this their first album released on a major label since 2007's Year Zero. The album title is derived from "hesitation wounds", marks that are produced by testing a bladed weapon before attempting suicide or self-harming.[3]

On August 12, 2013, Amazon UK officially made the second track, "Copy of A", available for free to download. On August 22, 2013, a radio rip of "Find My Way" was uploaded to YouTube.[4] On August 27, 2013, the album was streamed on iTunes after it leaked online.[5][6] The album is available in two different masters for digital download, a "standard" version and an "Audiophile Mastered Version" - the latter having extended dynamic range, not meant to be competitive in the loudness war.[7][8]

Background

In February 2009, Trent Reznor stated, "I've been thinking for some time now it's time to make NIN disappear for a while", indicating the possible end of the act.[9] Nine Inch Nails then entered a hiatus after touring with Jane's Addiction and performing on a few subsequent shows.[9][10][11] Afterwards, Reznor clarified that the band was done with touring for the foreseeable future, but that he would continue to make music under the moniker.[12]

Since then, Reznor pursued other projects. In 2010, he formed the post-industrial project, How to Destroy Angels with long-time collaborator Atticus Ross and West Indian Girl frontwoman Mariqueen Maandig, whom he married in 2009.[13][14] In 2010, Reznor also collaborated with Atticus Ross on the original score for David Fincher's 2010 film, The Social Network.[15] The duo won a 2010 Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score for a Motion Picture and a 2010 Academy Award for Best Original Score. Reznor and Ross again collaborated with Fincher for the official score the American adaptation of the novel The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, released in December 2011.[16]

In an interview with BBC Radio 1, Reznor indicated that he would be writing for the majority of 2012 with Nine Inch Nails "in mind".[17] In 2012, Reznor confirmed that he was working on new Nine Inch Nails material and would possibly be performing live again.[18][19][20] In February 2013, Reznor announced the return of Nine Inch Nails and revealed tour details.[21] The album was first acknowledged by Trent Reznor on May 28, 2013 in a post on nin.com:

I've been less than honest about what I've really been up to lately. For the last year I've been secretly working non-stop with Atticus Ross and Alan Moulder on a new, full-length Nine Inch Nails record, which I am happy to say is finished and frankly fucking great. This is the real impetus and motivation behind the decision to assemble a new band and tour again. My forays into film, HTDA and other projects really stimulated me creatively and I decided to focus that energy on taking Nine Inch Nails to a new place. Here we go!"[22]

The album began life as a couple of tracks that were meant to be included in a forthcoming greatest hits package for Interscope Records. The sessions gave way to more songs and ended up yielding an entire album.[23] The two songs originally written and recorded for the hits package were revealed to be "Everything" and "Satellite".[24]

Packaging

Each version of the album has its own cover with artwork by Russell Mills[25] whose art was previously used 19 years earlier on The Downward Spiral, its accompanying singles, and the double VHS set Closure.

About the cover arts, Mills said:

This renewed collaboration very quickly suggested massive potential for the strange and the familiar to collide and collude in works that I hoped would encapsulate, by allusion, suggestion, metaphor and association, the conceptual ideas imbued in the album as well as in the undertow of its sonic world. I've tried to make works that obliquely allude to the essence of the subject matter, to its emotional core. I hope that they will invite multiple readings.[26][27]

Mills also explained that the works explore ideas of "catharsis, of being into dissolution into being, both on a personal and sociological level." Mills said that the works allude to ideas about chaos and order. He also described the artworks as a "cross between the forensic and a pathology of the personal in which only fragments remain, in which minimal clues can suggest events that may have occurred."[28]

During the creation of the cover arts, Mills used traditional materials such as oils, acrylic paints, varnishes and wires as well as miscellaneous objects which were subject to various chemical processes, including burning, bleaching, calcification and erosion.[27] Blood was used for standard CD cover and digital cover.[29]

Alternative cover arts
  • It should be noted that the covers of the Japanese and Australian/EU standard CDs are a variation on the cover of the US standard CD, with the painting oriented sideways and, in the case of the Japanese cover, photographed from a slightly different vantage point and lighter in hue. The digital Audiophile Mastered Version cover is a variation on the standard digital cover, with the painting again oriented sideways.

Critical reception

Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
SourceRating
Metacritic(76/100)[30]
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[31]
Alternative Press[32]
Consequence of Sound[33]
Entertainment WeeklyB+[34]
The Guardian[35]
Kerrang![36]
NME8/10[37]
Pitchfork Media7.0/10[38]
Rolling Stone[39]
Spin9/10[40]

Critical reception for the album so far has been positive. At Metacritic, which assigns a rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album has received an average score of 76, based on 36 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[30]

The Audiophile Mastered Version of the album has been the subject of discussion on several audio-related websites which claim that its "audiophile" credentials are debatable since its dynamic range is not much higher than the standard version due to audio compression.[41][42]

Commercial performance

Hesitation Marks debuted at number three on the Billboard 200 with 107,000 copies sold in its first week, Nine Inch Nails' fifth top five album.[43] The album has sold at least 256,000 copies, spending several weeks in the top 100of the Billboard 200 Album Charts. In Canada, the album debuted atop the Canadian Albums Chart with first-week sales of 12,000 copies, becoming the band's first number-one album on the chart.[44] The album was certified Gold in Canada on September 26, 2013.[45] The album sold 12,286 copies to enter the UK Albums Chart at number two, earning the band its highest-charting album yet in the United Kingdom.[46]

Track listing

The full track listing was announced on June 21, 2013, along with the credits.[47] The deluxe edition features 3 additional remixes and an interview with Trent Reznor. The interview also includes three untitled demo songs from the album sessions, along with a demo sample of the song "All Time Low":[48]

All songs written by Trent Reznor, except "The Eater of Dreams" by Trent Reznor and Alessandro Cortini. "While I'm Still Here" contains a lyrical interpolation from "Weary Blues From Waitin'" written and performed by Hank Williams.

No.TitleLength
1."The Eater of Dreams"0:52
2."Copy of A"5:23
3."Came Back Haunted"5:17
4."Find My Way"5:16
5."All Time Low"6:18
6."Disappointed"5:44
7."Everything"3:20
8."Satellite"5:03
9."Various Methods of Escape"5:01
10."Running"4:08
11."I Would for You"4:33
12."In Two"5:32
13."While I'm Still Here"4:03
14."Black Noise"1:29
Japanese edition bonus track[49]
No.TitleLength
15."Everything" (Autolux Remix)4:29
Deluxe edition bonus tracks
No.TitleLength
15."Find My Way" (Oneohtrix Point Never Remix)4:47
16."All Time Low" (Todd Rundgren Remix)5:49
17."While I'm Still Here" (Breyer P-Orridge 'Howler' Remix)7:03
iTunes Store bonus track
No.TitleLength
18."Trent Reznor in Conversation With..."41:58

Personnel

  • Trent Reznor – vocal and instrumental performance, production
Additional musicians
Technical personnel

Charts

Chart (2013) Peak
position
Australian Albums Chart[50] 3
Austrian Albums Chart[51] 2
Belgian Albums Chart (Flanders)[52] 6
Belgian Albums Chart (Wallonia)[53] 14
Canadian Albums Chart[54] 1
Czech Albums Chart[55] 4
Danish Albums Chart[56] 9
Dutch Albums Chart[57] 9
Finnish Albums Chart[58] 17
French Albums Chart[59] 22
German Albums Chart[60] 5
Greek Albums Chart[61] 11
Irish Albums Chart[62] 5
Italian Albums Chart[63] 16
Japanese Albums Chart[64] 14
New Zealand Albums Chart[65] 7
Norwegian Albums Chart[66] 23
Polish Albums Chart[67] 17
Portuguese Albums Chart[68] 13
Scottish Albums Chart[69] 2
South Korean Albums Chart[70] 58
Spanish Albums Chart[71] 20
Swedish Albums Chart[72] 37
Swiss Albums Chart[73] 5
UK Albums Chart[74] 2
US Billboard 200[75] 3
US Alternative Albums[76] 1
US Rock Albums[77] 1

Certifications

Region Certification Certified units/sales
Canada (Music Canada)[45] Gold 40,000^
Portugal (AFP)[78] Gold 7,500^

* Sales figures based on certification alone.
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.

Release history

Region Date Label
Australia[79] August 30, 2013 Universal Music
Netherlands[80]
Germany[81] Polydor Records
Ireland[82]
United Kingdom[83] September 2, 2013
France[84] Mercury Records
United States[85] September 3, 2013 Columbia, The Null Corporation
Italy[86] Universal Music
Japan[49] September 4, 2013

References

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  2. ^ [1]
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  7. ^ Trent Reznor Fights The Loudness Wars, Offers ‘Loud’ & ‘Audiophile’ Masters Of Hesitation Marks » Synthtopia
  8. ^ NIN's Hesitation Marks Will Come In an Audio-Nerds-Only Version
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