10 Perfect Rock Albums Ruined By One Bad Song

The entire concept of the Downward Spiral by Nine Inch Nails is not exactly for the faint of heart. Over an hours' worth of material, Trent Reznor takes the listener to nearly every dark place he can think of, with songs that range from ambient pieces of terror to assaults on the ears that leave you battered and bruised by the end of things. When you have an album with that broad a thesis statement, did we really need a song like Big Man With A Gun?

Well, technically you can see why a song like this would work in context, since this is about the protagonist of the story sinking to the lowest level of violence and lust that he can think of. When you hear why Trent actually wrote it, it just seems a bit too shallow compared to the rest of the record. As opposed to his own self destruction, Trent originally conceived this as a play on the gangsta rap genre, which he thought catered to more misogynistic tendencies.

After years away from the headspace of this record, even Trent though that he should have cut this track, thinking that it didn't really fit with the rest of the songs. It's far from being the worst thing that Nine Inch Nails ever recorded, but this is the kind of tune that is meant to be a B-side.