Nine Inch Nails – Broken

Sounds good and well pressed. The EQ is quite a bit darker than my CD - upper mids and upwards being much more subdued - an choice that I don't necessary disagree with. Wondering if this is related to production or mastering.

both my 12" and 7" are very crackly, which really messes with "pinion" and "help me i am in hell". the rest of the album is loud enough to blanket it but i'm disappointed in that field.

something i'm not disappointed in is the sound quality- if you can tune out the fact that this record sounds deep-fried, vinyl is the way to go for this EP. adds a whole nother dimension to that raw trent reznor early 90's angst!

side note: if you own any record cleaning apparatus that positions the record vertically, it's best to cover up the label with tape or something on the etched side. there's no grooves to catch the water so it just runs all over the label, had i not wiped it up soon enough it could have ended up somewhat damaged.

3/5, get another press of this album if you can but if this is all you can get and you're good at tuning out the sheer crispiness of the crackling then it'll do

What a definitive edition... the 33 rpm record sounds good, and the songs on the 45 rpm record sound even better (more detailed and dynamic), but what a disaster of packaging and pressing...

My 7" is perfect, the 12" record has pops and noise background in the first half going through the silent ages (didn't disappear after multiple washes) and came very wavy, it is clear that this is caused by the etched on side B (a waste of space that contributes nothing) or by having packed the small record together with the large one in a single jacket, having used a gatefold would have helped.
Why not put the songs on both sides at 45 rpm, taking advantage of space and the best possible quality?

They also changed the layout of the original design, such as the lettering and the opening position of the inner sleeve, which is now on the side and not at the top, forcing it to rotate and change its orientation to protect the record when storing it... The poly-lined envelopes that come for each record are so large that they don't fit in the inner sleeves, which are made of thin, cheap quality paper.
*The 7" inner sleeve isn't a 'heavy card stock' as described in the Notes, but a very thin one too....
This is an unhappy edition "meticulously prepared by Trent Reznor and NIN art director John Crawford":(

Mine has the same matrix listed here with P USA. Looks to be the same exact pressing of my 2017 US copy. Only difference is the jacket has a sticker saying "Made in ".