BROKEN

This is extreme music. This is what Trent Reznor wanted to make after the huge success of Pretty Hate Machine, but the record company wanted a new record that was basically a copy of PHM. Reznor switched labels after some litigation and got what he wanted, thanks to Jimmy Iovine introducing him to Intrerscope. At first, Reznor didn't like Interscope either and was suspicious of them wanting the same thing as the previous record company, but he was given the freedom he wanted and recorded this EP of noise and heavy industrial rock.

This recording works well and one of the main reasons is because of it's EP length. It contains a short instrumental that builds the tension, two hard and heavy tracks, followed by another tension building short instrumental and then two more rip ass songs. After that, you get two excellent covers, in my opinion, the best part of the album. "Physical" is an Adam Ant cover with all the pop elements ripped away by an amazing wall of sound. "Suck" is a Pigface cover which is a band featuring Ministry and Reznor. This time the industrial is very prominent again, but the 2 covers are maybe just a tiny bit less noisy....but then again....maybe not. Explosive, emotional, angry and exciting. Progressive because of the broken barriers apparent in the music and production more than the actual song formation, but progressive nevertheless. There would be better albums to come, but this one is still and excellent addition to any prog rock collection.