Ian+B

= [|Nine Inch Nails]  =
 * This is really really late but I had trouble getting internet in Ireland. This is Pitchfork's 2.0 score review of the third NIN album . It just really stuck with me because it paints such a convincing portrait of how listening to a bad album is like.**
 * 

By
Brent DiCrescenzo==== ; September 21, 1999 ==== score: 2.0 >> [|Nine Inch Nails] >> Insound Vinyl eMusic Amazon MP3 & CD  1:00am: I've gathered my supplies and I'm going to sit this one straight through. Trent's going to keep me up for at least another two hours with his latest bloated indulgence, //The Fragile//. So I've got a pot of coffee. It's black. Pitch black. As black as your fucking //soul//! And I'm typing on this machine. This machine is grinding me down. I feel like a fucking //machine//! Grrrarrrgh! 9:00pm: My first experience with //The Fragile//, as is the case with most new CDs, comes in my Honda. I'm sitting at a red light on Webster and Damen, waiting for a left turn. Trent Reznor is screaming, "Tear a hole exquisite red/ Fuck the rest and stab it dead" over a troop of industrial guitars and digital whining. I yawn with such stretching intensity that I miss my turn light. The entire situation strikes me as particularly humorous. Here I am-- a 24- year- old white guy with floppy bangs, wearing a tie, driving a Honda-- and all the bile Trent Reznor can must muster up from his supposedly scorched soul makes me yawn. Sometime over the last decade, music that is intrinsically meant to be menacing (i.e. Nine Inch Nails) has become a banal syndicated- action hour soundtrack. It's easy to imagine the overproduced grind of "The Wretched" blaring through a TV screen as Nightman kicks a henchman off a roof. This stuff could be the score to "The Crow 4: In Space." And this time around, Trent has unanimously failed to shock anyone above the age of 15 and under the age of 54. I mean, have you listened to old Judas Priest lately? Now, this is not to say music must be confrontational, although the best of it typically is. However, in a pop society that has become numb to industrial sounds through ESPN2 and Surge commercials, it's no longer interesting or tolerable to base one's entire output on volume and amplified cliches. And so "Somewhat Damaged" continues to pound out its same four notes. Systematically, layers of crust, fuzz, dirt, and whatever else Reznor can scrape off the walls in his studio are piled on top, pounding out the same four- note scale. 1-2-3-4. 1-2-3-4. 1-2-3-4. Ooh, wow, did he just say "fuck?" Trent, Holden Caulfield rubbed that out 50 years ago. 8:00pm: "Hello?" asks Ryan. "Okay, I'm going to read you something," I say. "Oh, hey dude. Um, sure." "'She shines/ In a world full of ugliness/ She matters/ When everything is meaningless.'" "Oh, man." "'Sometimes I have everything/ Yet I wish I felt something.'" "Are these lyrics?" "'Underneath it all/ We feel so small/ The Heavens fall / But still we crawl.'" "Haha. What is this?" "Pleading and/ Needing and/ Bleeding and/ Breeding and/ Feeding/ Exceeding." "Rhyme-y." "Now everything is clear/ I can erase the fear/ I can disapper." "Man, what is this. Is this some emo album?" "I am every fucking thing and just a little more/ And when I suck you off not a drop will go to waste/ It's really not so bad, you know, once you get past the taste, yeah/ Starfuckers." "No. Oh, no. No. It's Nine Inch Nails!" 1:49am: "Even Deeper," a track mixed by Dr. Dre, spits aluminum riffs into my headphones. The entire concept of pairing of Dr. Dre and Nine Inch Nails, a match maid in Kornboy heaven (or most likely the Interscope commissary) is laughable. Shuffling beats squirt under "Blade Runner" booms and fathoms of string samples. The end product sounds entirely similar to the rest of this 104- minute albatross. The token celebrity stroking of this studio marriage is fittingly overwrought, unnecessary and done with questionable intent. From the sound of it, Trent cares little to broaden his palate from this rap/ rock union. Without the liner notes, one would never pick this song as "the Dr. Dre track." Ironically, a man hailed by his legion of testoster- drones as "genius" often leans heavily on the work of other, better sound wizards. Adrian Belew, Steve Albini, and Alan Moulder conspicuously leave their fingerprints all over //The Fragile//. In other words, whenever something sounds cool, it's most likely coming from one of these other men, who have worked on such mind- blowing classics like Talking Heads' //Remain in Light//, Slint's//Spiderland//, and My Bloody Valentine's //Loveless//, respectively. The constipated drone of "The Day the World Went Away" unabashedly attempts to mimic My Bloody Valentine's sculpted cacophony. Unfortunately, from the hands of an unsubtle goth, the result is strained fuzz. 2:00am: Trent Reznor is the worst, most predictable, most uninspired lyricist working today. The freshman gloom spouted throughout //The Fragile// are only making it easier for the Goth Lyric Generators on the web. Copy the word decay from this sentence. Paste it into a Word document. Highlight it. Press Shift-F7. Every synonym that appears on your thesaurus screen pops up in Trent Renzor's pitiful poetry. Coming from the mouth of a steadily plumping, thirtysomething recluse (who, incidentally, is bearing striking resemblance to Phil Hartman's SNL Frankenstein character these days), it's just sad. Does he collect candelabras and "Spawn" comics? I guarantee it. In the five years it's taken to complete //The Fragile//, Trent seemingly watched Dark City at least 40 times. It's insulting to hear Trent and his PR firm talk up the "radical departure" and pop flourishes on this record because the record sounds 100% similar to //Broken// and //The Downward Spiral//. Or more accurately, it's like combining//Broken// and //The Downward Spiral//. Clever. 2:45am: The gentle piano plunking of "La Mer" lulls me to sleep momentarily on its second time around. It's not the gentle ambience of it, though, since this loud sludge could knock out a speed addict. //The Fragile// is the most taxing record I've ever had to work through in my five years of reviewing CDs. I mean, even the Beatles failed to make a double album without throwing in some filler. Why does Trent Reznor thinking he can succeed? I'm actually glad Billy Corgan used up //The Infinite Sadness//. Reznor would jump all over a title like that. It's difficult to decide where to even begin trimming //The Fragile//. It's so stunningly monotonous. Any bit of it could be lost without notice. I mean, when the instrumental interludes carry an album, it's a blaring neon sign flashing "stay away!" I pity the kids of the style- over- substance generation-- and yes, it will only be kids-- who enjoy this album. Kids, high school isn't as bad as it seems. You'll grow out of this phase. Save yourself, or your parents, the 25 bucks. //The Fragile//'s length begins to make sense in this context. 104 minutes is the perfect duration for those post- dinner, pre- "X-Files" periods of "nobody understands me" bedroom isolation sit-ins. 3:00am: Before getting back into //The Fragile//, I peruse the liner notes and artwork. David Carson of "Raygun" fame laid out the artwork for //The Fragile//. And what a fitting look! Carson, whose design work broke new ground for typography, lost touch years ago. The originator of the 1990s' trademark "crusty look" is analogous to the fat- bottomed disco fonts of the '70s or the thin sans- serif of deco. But guess what? It's almost 2000 and the world needs a new look and a new sound. Carson and Reznor will forever be remembered as 1990s pop figures that helped create an identifiable logo for the decade, and little else. Trent, you are Flock of Seagulls. //The Fragile// embodies everything wrong with this decade-- hype, letdown, technological fetishism, empty rage, financial bloat, bombast, self- loathing, and indifference to anything truly important and interesting flowing underneath the surface. Trent Reznor is Chris Gaines. 3:20am: "Starfuckers, Inc." That's pretty much all I have to say in criticism of this album. That sums it right up. Do you or don't you want to own an album with a song called "Starfuckers, Inc?" Besides the snickering potty- mouthed title, it's one of the most blatantly hypocritical attacks ever put to tape. It's a widely- publicized attack on Marilyn Manson. There are several lyrical references to the gangly idiot such as "I'm one of the beautiful ones" and "My god pouts on the cover of a magazine." And how are these jabs delivered? Why, in a song which sounds //exactly// like Marilyn Manson (and also borrows from Carly Simon), by a man who pouts on the cover of Rolling Stone, Alternative Press, Spin, etc. In essence, Reznor is Marilyn Manson without the makeup (which is a bit like Kiss without the makeup). //The Fragile// is simply //Music for 'The Elder// for the digital age. I take comfort knowing that the passing of another decade will make this record seem as amusingly insincere as 10CC. And at this point, I'm angry, hungry, and frustrated. In fact, I feel like kinda like Trent Reznor. Is this the grand design? After over two hours of listening to his incessant whining and grating, I've become the very model of his audience.
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 * numbah furr! Time for some serious HamLet action!**

The potent poison quite o'er-crows my spirit: I cannot live to hear the news from England; But I do prophesy the election lights On Fortinbras: he has my dying voice; So tell him, with the occurrents, more and less, Which have solicited. The rest is silence.
 * Here's Hamlet's (for real this time final monologue)**


 * As "**** The rest is silence" is the last sentence spoken by one of literature's most infamous characters, there have no doubt been quite a few takes on this thing, many of which are from Icanhazcheezeboggah.com **







[] **Hamlet could be complaining/commenting on the emptiness of an unfulfilled life, or how simply death feels, the dingy silent and empty void far too many of Shakespeare's characters go into without the honor of being played by Orson Welles before they go. Maybe he's suddenly realized that his dramatic monologue has got to end sometime, even though he has much more to do and say. The problem(or benefit) of deliberately opaque lines is they hold up to exuberant amounts of analysis without really giving anything back, subsequently meaning very much and nothing much at all. It can be beaten to death, but no one, not even Shakespeare, can give an unquestionable explanation. And with that, the rest is silence...**
 * I really think these sorts of images are starting to make me hate cats. It's pretty played out now, but stilllllllllllllllllllll.......lllllllllll...**
 * One way to look at it is how Hamlet clearly would of had a lot going on if he hadn't got lost in ye old tragedy swamp, a place that seems to get harder to escape even as there are more bodies to float around on...**

KING CLAUDIUS Now, Hamlet, where's Polonius? HAMLET At supper. KING CLAUDIUS
 * More and More! (#3)**

At supper! where? HAMLET Not where he eats, but where he is eaten: a certain convocation of politic worms are e'en at him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet: we fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots: your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service, two dishes, but to one table: <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">that's the end. <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">KING CLAUDIUS <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">Alas, alas! <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">HAMLET <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">king, and cat of the fish that hath fed of that worm. <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">KING CLAUDIUS <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">What dost you mean by this? <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">HAMLET <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">Nothing but to show you how a king may go a <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">progress through the guts of a beggar. <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">KING CLAUDIUS <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">Where is Polonius? <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">HAMLET <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">In heaven; send hither to see: if your messenger <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">find him not there, seek him i' the other place <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">yourself. But indeed, if you find him not within <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">this month, you shall nose him as you go up the <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">stairs into the lobby. <span style="background-color: #ffe4ca; display: block; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;">(4.3.1)

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">HAMLET- <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">Remember thee! <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">Yea, from the table of my memory <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">I'll wipe away all trivial fond records, <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past, <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">That youth and observation copied there; <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">And thy commandment all alone shall live <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">Within the book and volume of my brain, <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">Unmix'd with baser matter: yes, by heaven! <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #333333; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: small; text-align: left;">(2.2)
 * Hamlet had a lot of visible dislike for Polonius from practically the moment the play started, so it's not really much of a surprise that sooner or later Hamlet was going to do him in. Hamlet seems to have few sentiments over his murder of Polonius other than his disappointment over not magically murdering Claudius. I think h just hoped that Claudius would be there so he could kill him without having to worry over morality and consequences: by killing him through the curtain, Hamlet would lose his direct attachment to Claudius and would leave with a mostly clear conscious. Hamlet's fully back into inscrutable mode by the time this interaction rolls around, perhaps not to just conceal the severity of his act from others, but also from himself.**
 * I guess I was confused over what to do for #2, but here it is...**
 * I guess I was confused over what to do for #2, but here it is...**
 * OK, in this scene, which occurs just after Hamlet's first (and possibly only) encounter with the ghost. Hamlet has been given new purpose and focus in his life, albeit a focus that is ultimately very, very destructive in his decision to take revenge on his Uncle, going so far as to push just about every other part of his life (Ophelia, his life, sanity) into the distant background. He's given new energy through his desire for murder, even if that desire quickly drags him and those around him to differing levels of confusion, insanity, and ultimately, death.**


 * 1:**
 * [[image:http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSj0YfyDfKCLMa5-puKx_4A0QXSePDZDo0XWaKVwBp7L-mL29fuRofbVTj8]]why did you have to play Hamlet? Whhhhhhhhhyyyyyyyyy?**

__//** Essential Question:To Be or Not To Be? When is a life not worth living? Who Gets to Decide if Someone Should Live or Die? **//__

Personally, I disagree with the idea of life not being worth living or someone having control over someone's life or death. Objectively, at least, there never seems to be a situation of true pointlessness or purposeless in life. However, it is entirely possible to convince oneself of anything, and i think that lies behind much of the characters' of Hamlet's motivations. so far, if the play is any more watchable/readable/watchable than the Mel Gibson version, umm, it might be worth it.

**is he wearing guyliner here too? I think th only advantage Mel Gibson Hamlet has is his lack of prevelant guyliner. Is t used to make Hamlet look more worn-out, or something?** While it seems Hamlet's Uncle's murdavations were out of simple greed, Hamlet is more complicated. Initially depressed and nearing suicide, Hamlet is given new motivation and purpose by his supposedly heroic desire to murder his uncle. He becomes obsessed with an objectively horrible idea, and it gives him peace and a reason for living. It's pretty fascinating.
 * OK i guess i had another page and I'm not exactly sure where the page goes. It seems like I've been able to find only one more Hamlet Blog so either I'm doing this wrong or Everyone else has put this off to the last minute. I guess I'll figure that out on monday.**