WikiPortallus: The Fragile.html

The Fragile (also known as Halo 14) is a concept double album by American Industrial rock act Nine Inch Nails, released in 1999 on Trent Reznor's Nothing Records. The album is Nine Inch Nails' third studio release and the fourteenth halo. The album continues the plot of The Downward Spiral, despite the complete change in sound and style of the album. Instead of heavily distorted instruments, and gritty industrial sounds, the album relies much more on soundscapes, electronic beats, ambient noise, and heavy metal-laden guitar, such as in the single "Starfuckers, Inc." Reznor describes the album's plot and story as "a theme of things falling apart." Reznor has also said the album is bleaker than The Downward Spiral, despite the more aggressive, depressing tone of that album. Many songs on the album borrow bass, guitar, and keyboard lines from other songs on the album; most notably "The Frail" piano becoming "The Fragile" guitar and the bassline used in "La Mer" reappearing in "Into the Void", something that's usual in a progressive record or a concept album.

History

The album was not as much of a commercial success as The Downward Spiral. Despite a strong start at #1 on the Billboard Top 10, the album quickly slipped out of the Billboard Top 10 only a week after its release, and Reznor was forced to provide funding for the subsequent North American tour out of his own pocket.¹ The cover artwork was designed by David Carson.

The song "I'm Looking Forward to Joining You, Finally" is credited in the album's booklet as "for clara", suggesting that the song's topic, like "The Day the World Went Away", is about Trent's Grandmother, Clara Clark.^{citation needed}

The Fragile was ranked #390 in the book 'The Top 500 Heavy Metal Albums of All Time' by Martin Popoff.

Critical Response

The majority of critics responded to The Fragile positively with major publications such as Entertainment Weekly and Spin bestowing large amounts of praise upon it. Entertainment Weekly awarded the album with an A- and Spin gave The Fragile a 5/5 in addition to rating it as their favorite album of 1999. However not all critics were as receptive. Among these was Pitchfork Media who, in their review, gave The Fragile the low rating of 2/10, criticizing the album for what they considered to be overly melodramatic lyrics. Since its release, however, The Fragile has become a major favorite among Nine Inch Nails' fans with many considering it his best work.

Tour

In support of The Fragile the Nine Inch Nails live band reformed for the Fragility tour. The tour began in late 1999 and lasted until mid-2000, spanning Europe, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, and North America.³ The tour consisted of two major legs, labeled Fragility 1.0 and Fragility 2.0. The live band lineup remained largely the same from the previous tour in support of The Downward Spiral, featuring Robin Finck on guitar, Charlie Clouser on keyboards, and Danny Lohner on bass guitar.⁴⁵ Reznor held open auditions to find a new drummer, eventually picking then-unknown Jerome Dillon.⁶

In 2002, the tour documentary And All That Could Have Been was released featuring performances from the Fragility 2.0 tour. While making the DVD, Reznor commented on the tour in retrospect by saying "I thought the show was really, really good when we were doing it",⁷ but later wrote that "I can't watch it at all. I was sick for most of that tour and I really don't think it was Nine Inch Nails at its best."⁸

Track listing

The CD version is the shortest of releases, missing the "Appendage" from the cassette version of "Please" as well as extended versions that appear on the vinyl release. The vinyl release is the longest version of The Fragile, containing tracks "10 Miles High" and "The New Flesh", songs later to be released on CD singles for the single "We're In This Together". The vinyl version is missing the "Appendage" which appears at the end of the "Please" cassette version and "With Decay" which appears at the end of "Ripe" on the CD and cassette versions. The vinyl version also contains extended versions of some songs. The cassette version of the album is identical to the CD pressing, with the addition of "Appendage" tagged onto the end of "Please". Presented is the CD track listing.

Disc one (Left)
#	Title	Length
1.	"Somewhat Damaged" (Reznor, Danny Lohner)	4:31
2.	"The Day the World Went Away"	4:33
3.	"The Frail"	1:54
4.	"The Wretched"	5:25
5.	"We're in This Together"	7:16
6.	"The Fragile"	4:35
7.	"Just Like You Imagined"	3:49
8.	"Even Deeper" (Reznor, Lohner)	5:48
9.	"Pilgrimage"	3:31
10.	"No, You Don't"	3:35
11.	"La Mer"	4:37
12.	"The Great Below"	5:17

Disc two (Right)
#	Title	Length
1.	"The Way Out Is Through" (Reznor, Keith Hillebrandt, Charlie Clouser)	4:17
2.	"Into the Void"	4:49
3.	"Where Is Everybody?"	5:40
4.	"The Mark Has Been Made" (Contains a 30 second hidden piece of "10 Miles High" in the pregap.)	5:15
5.	"Please"	3:30
6.	"Starfuckers, Inc." (Reznor, Clouser)	5:00
7.	"Complication"	2:30
8.	"I'm Looking Forward to Joining You, Finally"	4:13
9.	"The Big Come Down"	4:12
10.	"Underneath It All"	2:46
11.	"Ripe (With Decay)"	6:34

"The New Flesh"

In The Fragile era, nin.com released "The New Flesh (version a)" (1:22) and "The New Flesh (version b)" (1:07).

While "The New Flesh" has never been played live in the traditional sense, instrumental portions of "The New Flesh" crossfaded quickly into "Pinion" formed a prerecorded intro to the Fragility tour shows of 1999 and 2000. The snippet was included on the DVD version of And All that Could Have Been (2002). Sometimes the finale of the intro featured Trent Reznor screaming "give it to me, I can take it." The same combination was used in some shows of the 2006 With Teeth tour.

Personnel

Chart positions

Album

Singles

References

^ Soeder, John (2000-04-09). "Rock's outlook bleak, but this Nail won't bend". Cleveland.com.
^ 21 August 1999 Last accessed April 15, 2007.
^ Elfman, Doug (2000-06-02). "Quite a Contrast" (fee required), Las Vegas Review-Journal. Retrieved on 1 February 2008.
^ "Guitarist Robin Finck Leaves GN'R To Return To NIN". MTV.com (1999-08-04). Retrieved on 2008-02-08.
^ Mancini, Robert (1999-09-28). "Nine Inch Nails Line Up European Shows, But States Must Wait". MTV.com. Retrieved on 2008-02-08.
^ Rashidii, Waleed. "Jerome Dillon – New With NIN". Modern Drummer. Retrieved on 2008-02-09.
^ Saraceno, Christina and Austin Scaggs (2001-06-08). "NIN Doing Fragility DVD". Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
^ Reznor, Trent (2004-07-21). "Access". Nine Inch Nails. Archived from the original on 2007-05-14. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Billboard Music Charts - Search Results - Nine Inch Nails". Billboard. Retrieved on 2007-09-28.
^ "Nine Inch Nails Survivalism". Top40-Charts.com (2007-04-22). Retrieved on 2007-06-01.
^ "Chart Stats - Nine Inch Nails". Chart Stats. Retrieved on 2007-09-28.

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