His 1989 debut, Pretty Hate Machine, wasn’t a big seller when it was first released, and some people complained that it was lightweight compared to, say, Foetus or Ministry. But doesn’t matter; clearly, NIN was on to something that no one else had quite figured out yet 

 Three years later, following a nasty feud with his record company, Reznor seemed determined to never be called a lightweight again. Broken, a six-song EP with two bonus tracks, ups the sonic ante considerably, unleashing distorted howls of rage. 

 Four NIN releases have been followed by a disc consisting solely of remixes, of which this is the first. Though not without interest, these collections don’t add up to much. 

 The perfect soundtrack to a nervous breakdown, a suicide, or just a bad, bad day, Reznor’s masterwork blends perversely irresistible pop (the Prince-like “Closer,”), soothing ambient instrumentals (“A Warm Place”), and violent noisefests (“Big Man With a Gun”). 

 Further Down the Spiral doesn’t add up to much without easy access to a club-level sound system and the intoxicant(s) of your choice–unless you’re a studio rat too, that is. 

 NIN’s monumental double-disc bid for the art-rock crown, this sounds fantastic from start to finish, but there aren’t enough memorable tunes underneath the alluring surfaces. The best thing about the album is that it suggests Reznor’s poormiserable-me persona may be reaching its limits. 

 Things Falling Apart is a remix album based on The Fragile's tracks. 

 In its current one-disc form, And All That Could Have Been is your garden-variety live album. Song arrangements differ slightly from the studio versions and Reznor curses more often, but it’s far from a necessity.  

 With Teeth has a lot of sonic firepower, and a couple of terrific songs, especially "The Hand That Feeds." But neither Reznor's songwriting nor his performances budge an inch from the territory they staked out years earlier. 

 Year Zero is more of the same, with perhaps a few more varieties of digital distortion thrown in (the second half of "The Great Destroyer" is a drum loop run through seemingly every filter ever programmed). Lyrically, it's a high-concept suite about a future American dystopia. 

 Year Zero Remixed is yet another of NIN's trademark remix albums, Reznor not getting fancy with the title. 

 Finally beholden to nobody else's record label, Reznor recorded a peculiar offering to his cult: Ghosts, a two-hour set of mostly-instrumental mood pieces (with a bit of extra guitar from Adrian Belew). 

 From the moment Reznor starts yowling "I don't feel anything at all" on "1,000,000," it's clear that this is going to be another totally acceptable NIN-by-numbers record: more BDSM imagery, more grime-and-oil-caked disco beats, more icy piano interludes, neither an advance nor a retreat.