All That Could Have Been

Electronic music doesn't generally lend itself to live performance. Sound quality is generally to distorted to be able to discern the different subtle elements that make the music work in the first place, and often the massive amounts of production don't translate will to a live arena. NIN, however, works. The audience starts a little high in the mix but that's fixed fairly quickly, and the sound quality for the music is superb.

Obviously this focuses on material from Fragile, but there are some nice older gems like Terrible Lie, Wish, Closer, and Head Like a Hole which will please longtime fans. I think that Fragile was incredibly underrated and this really expresses how passionate and delicately constructed the new material is. Trent has a presence which can be felt viscerally on this and the darkness is almost overwhelming. Makes Joy Division seem almost cheery at times.Some stores also have a "limited edition" (of about 100,000 copies) ep called "Still" which is a collection of minimalist remixes of several tracks. Very eerie, and quite moving as well.