Trent Reznor Chord Theory
Whether it’s in his music as Nine Inch Nails, his soundtrack work in collaboration with Atticus Ross, or with How to Destroy Angels, Trent Reznor’s sound is always uniquely identifiable. Although part of this is due to his sound design, involving digital distortion and noise processing a variety of sound sources, his use of harmony, chords, and melody also has a major impact on his sound. Reznor’s music has a distinctly anxious tone that sets the scene for his often bleak lyrics.
In the film Sound City, Reznor explains that he has a music theory foundation, specifically in relation to the keyboard, and that this subconsciously affects his writing. In this article, I’ll look at some carefully selected examples of Trent Reznor’s songwriting and try to figure what he does to make his music sound so unique.
“My grandma pushed me into piano. I remember when I was 5, I started taking classical lessons. I liked it, and I felt like I was good at it, and I knew in life that I was supposed to make music. I practiced long and hard and studied and learned how to play an instrument that provided me a foundation where I can base everything I think of in terms of where it sits on the piano… I like having that foundation in there. That’s a very un-punk rock thing to say. Understanding an instrument, and thinking about it, and learning that skill has been invaluable to me.” – Trent Reznor (Sound City)
This article can be viewed with either accompanying music notation or MIDI piano roll diagrams.
Minor Keys
Music theory can be confusing, and multiple schools of thinking (classical, jazz, modal), along with multiples names for the same thing contribute to this. I’ll use both music notation and piano roll to illustrate the musical concepts, but to quickly sum up some terms I’ll use:
A scale is a series of notes that starts and ends on the same note. Commonly, scales have 5 or 7 notes.
A key is the chord a piece resolves to. A piece that resolves to a C Major chord is in the key of C major. If the piece is entirely diatonic (in key), then the melody and chords will all be notes from the C major scale.
The natural minor scale is a series of notes that have minor, or flattened degrees, specifically a♭3, b6 and b7. In contrast with the major scale, it has a sombre sound, thus the name.
The dorian scale is a minor scale that has a natural 6th, instead of the flattened 6th found in the natural minor scale. This gives it a brighter sound, whilst still retaining a minor tonality. Note that it should really be referred to as a mode instead of a scale, but that’s outside the scope of this article, so I’ll call it a scale.
The term, minor key is more complex, and refers to any scale that has a minor third, but variable 6th and 7th degrees. By changing these 6th and 7th degrees, you can create new flavours.
A relative major or relative minor are keys that contain the same notes as another key. For example the C major scale (C D E F G A B C) has the same notes as the A natural minor scale (A B C D E F G A). Despite having the same notes, they are different keys because of the ways they resolve, which is typically done by starting or ending on a certain chord.
Mantra
I’ll start by looking at Mantra, from Reznors appearance in the film Sound City. The song is a jam between Trent Reznor, Dave Grohl and Josh Homme, and the results are predictably inspiring. The songs extended outro, beginning at 4:47, involves a repeated bass pattern in E. Over this static bassline, Reznor adds a Wurlitzer chord part that chromatically moves between major, minor and suspended tonalities of E. This choice of inter-key movement perfectly illustrates Reznors gravitation towards chromatic harmony, and results in a simple musical part that instantly sounds like Trent Reznor.
- Mantra 00:00
The Line Begins to Blur
The Line Begins to Blur also blurs the line between major and minor, with a progression that starts C | B♭ | F, which is a V-IV-I sequence in the key of F major. The chord progression ends on D Major, which is entirely outside the key of F, although it only borrows one outside note, F♯. The outside chord gives the progression a harmonic ambiguity, and a powerful feeling of tension that must be resolved each time the progression repeats. Instead of fully resolving with the F chord, the music still feels restless. Note that the harmony is mostly fleshed out by the guitar part, which takes advantage of the chromatically rising E-F-F♯ line.
- The Line Begins to Blur 00:00
Minor / Dorian Switch
One of Trent Reznor’s signature tricks is to work in a minor key and switch between one with a minor or major 6th. In the key of D minor, these notes are B♭ and B natural, implying the natural minor and Dorian scales, respectively. As mentioned earlier, you just need to know that a minor key with a Major 6th sounds brighter than with a minor 6th. Compositionally, a song composed purely in D natural minor would use a Gm and B♭ chords, and a song composed purely in D Dorian would use G major and Bdim instead. Here’s a comparison, I personally feel that the Dorian has a smoother, cooler sound than the sombre sounding natural minor scale.
- Natural Minor Scale 00:00
- Dorian 00:00
Beside You In Time
Beside You in Time is in D minor, however it switches between these dorian and natural minor tonalities to create a harmonic twist. We start with a D minor chord, and move from there to a B♭ major chord, giving us the natural minor tonality with a B♭ note. The following chord is the twist, a G major chord, which comes from the D dorian tonality and has a B natural note. This sequence creates a chromatic rise of A (the 5th in D minor) to B♭, to B natural.
- Beside You In Time 00:00
Right Where It Belongs
Right Where It Belongs picks up from right where Beside You In Time ends, staying in D but transitioning to D major… kind of. Although the piano motif in bars 1 and 2 starts of with a D major chord with an F♯ melody note, bars 3 and 4 switch to D minor chords and melody, using an F natural note instead. This constant shifting between D major and D minor, which can be interpreted as happy and sad, gives the music a constantly shifting feeling, which helps give the album closer its emotional vibe.
- Right Where It Belongs 00:00
09 Ghosts I
09 Ghosts I, from the four-disc dark ambient work Ghosts I–IV, uses the same Natural Minor-to-Dorian trick. The song is in C minor, a tone lowering than Beside You In Time, but the chords follow the same progression. The chord progression ends with an A♭ chord, which implies C natural minor, followed by an F Major chord, from C dorian.
The 09 Ghosts I melody uses an A natural note in bar 4, but Trent Reznor is careful to not use it over the A♭ chord, to avoid a clashing note. Trent Reznor is aware of music theory, so is likely conscious of this harmonic trick.
- Ghosts I 00:00
02 Ghosts I
- Ghosts II 00:00
March of the Pigs
Going back to Trent Reznor’s breakthrough second album as Nine Inch Nails, 1994’s The Downward Spiral, Reznor definitely had harmony in mind, as well as motifs. The line “nothing can stop me now“ is repeated on three tracks, and there is also a recurring melodic motif that appears in Piggy, Closer and The Downward Spiral.
The breakdown in March of the Pigs is built on a bassline of D | A♭ | G | F. The part is sparse with little other melodic content, however Reznor’s vocal melody adds extra notes that slightly flesh out the harmony, and I’m interpreting the progression as Dm | A♭ | G | Fm. The progression is unusual because the first two chords, Dm and A♭, are a tritone away from each other, giving it that quasi-evil tone that bands like Black Sabbath love.
- March of the Pigs 00:00
Closer
One of the coolest melodic parts in Closer is an ascending line that plays after the first chorus, at the 1:25 mark. The bass part uses C and B♭ notes and the melodic line ascends the notes E | F | G | A♭. The first note E is from C major, and with the B♭ in the bass gives a C mixolydian sound. The final A♭ melodic note in bar 4 is not from C major or mixolydian, and has been borrowed from the C minor scale.
- Closer 00:00
- Closer Harmonized 00:00
Technically, Missing
Technically, Missing, from Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross’ Gone Girl soundtrack features a clever mix of major and minor. The song is in D, and the higher arpeggiated part is intentionally vague about being major or minor, as it doesn’t touch the 3rd interval, instead only featuring the notes D, G, A and C.
The bassline underneath the arpeggio plays the notes D C F♯ F C. The F♯ in bar 4 implies a D major chord over an F♯ root. Then, in bar 5 the bass note is F, which implies an F major chord that would come from a D minor key. The switch in harmony is subtle but effective, and primarily works because the composition doesn’t use the 3rd in the arpeggiated melodic part.
If you’re interested in reading about some of the synth patches uses in the Gone Girl soundtrack, check out my Reverb.com article, Recreating Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’ “Gone Girl” Score With Software Instruments.
- Technically Missing 00:00
Shit Mirror
Shit Mirror, from this years Nine Inch Nails release Bad Witch, throws all the harmonic rules out the window, opting for a largely chromatic chord progression. The songs progression starts in A major, implying that the song will be in the key of A major, but the next chord is F major. This could be from the A minor key, implying a switch from major to minor, just as in Right Where It Belongs. The next chord is E♭, which has nothing to do with either A major or A minor. Here the harmonic tricks have been ignored, thrown out the window, instead Reznor has used a completely unrelated chord. It may not adhere to any music theory rules, but it simply sounds good, so it works.
- Shit Mirror 00:00
Recap // MIDI Download
Thanks for reading, comment below with any songs you think I missed! If you want to download the MIDI files from the examples, simply click the button below, and be sure to subscribe to my newsletter to stay updated on new articles!
“When I’m writing music today, rarely do I sit down and think ‘Oh, this should resolve to that’, I don’t think of that shit. But subconsciously, I know I do.” – Trent Reznor (Sound City)
Download MIDI Files
Download the MIDI files for the musical examples in this article above. Note that you might need to rename the ‘.mid’ files to ‘.midi’ files, depending on which DAW you use.
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More Trent Reznor
For more Trent Reznor content, check out my sound design remake and breakdown of Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross’ In Motion, from their soundtrack to The Social Network.
More Chord Theory
For more music theory goodness, check out my article on Depeche Mode Chord Theory, a band who were an early influence for Trent Reznor.
Header artwork by Makarxart
15 thoughts on “Trent Reznor Chord Theory”
Thank you, great article. Now back to learning.
Excellent reading and curiosity sparks.
Question though when importing these midi files into GarageBand – they seem to stretch out ….
The base lines in ‘Mantra’ are either missing or are all jumbled into one line. Any advice would help thanks.
This is awesome, thanks so much for such great info!
I’m not an expert, but https://www.scales-chords.com says that Shit Mirror could fit E dorian b2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorian_%E2%99%AD2_scale
Thank your for this. Reznor doesn’t receive as much attention for his almost masterful manipulation of chords, keys, changes, etc. His ability to create such a wealth across of distinct, deeply and lastingly interesting music from such simple elements across multiple genres is damn near unparalleled. The lack of attention his songwriting receives is unfortunate because it could be very informative to anyone wanting to gain a greater explicit understanding of the applied mechanics of theory as well as a subconscious influence on their own songwriting. The “texture” and technological aspects of his music seem to have had a more noticeable influence on modern music but it’s his songwriting that makes his music enduringly viable. Good job casting a little light on the subject. I didn’t mean for that to diminutive because, as we both acknowledge, there’s an abundance of dissectable material, but you didn’t even get to touch on his use of chromatic scales and their interactions with other scales/keys. The transitions in “the becoming” are some of the most abrupt and profound yet effective in a completely seamless and natural way completely transforming the music, tone, emotion and total personality of the song from perhaps the most mechanized grotesquery to the most intimate tenderness reznor has ever written. Also, Spotify, Last Halloween, I believe, identified it as “the scariest song” through an algorithm that used its scale/s as part of its calculation.
Anyway, great job and the work you put in is genuinely appreciated!
I’m a guitarist, was looking for information about how to play Meet your Master intro on a guitar instead.
Stumbled on your website, and I gotta said it’s great work! Very interesting, very clear! Thanks for the time you’re putting into this, love it! Great quality!
INCREDIBLE
thanks!
What piano and e-piano plugins are you using if I may ask?
Love it! It’d be interesting to see an article on how Reznor hanfles harmony in Year Zero, where many tracks seem to be based on only 1-2 chords.
Really enjoyed this post — would love to read more !
This is amazing. Been a NIN fan forever.. You’ve broken this down so well. More importantly, you made it very understandable!
LOVE THESE READS!!!!!
This is really cool! Could you take another look at the March of the Pigs sentence "The part because the second chord is a tritone away from the first chord, giving it that quasi-evil tone that bands like Black Sabbath love." I think there is a word or two missing there that I don’t know enough music theory to intuit. 😉
thanks for the heads up! Changed it to "The progression is unusual because…"