This is my first post here, so feel free to ignore me because I'm a newbie and, therefor, a complete idiot.
The way I think of this is, the "character" in the album never actually kills himself. He's not that lucky. In both of these last two songs, the suicide is just an idle fantasy that he never goes through with. In "The Downward Spiral," the screams and such are a metaphor for his mad desperation to make the pain go away. In the song "Hurt," he gets his wish; it doesn't hurt anymore. The pain is gone, but he has become so dehumanized that there's nothing else left. He is the living dead.
@sykodude Most likely yes, and his new hardcore determination coming through in the song "nothing can stop me now". When you no longer have any barriers holding you back from becoming whatever you want to be, unlimited potential is unlocked. So although an extremely dark and disturbingly depressing scene, the character is coming to terms with this unresolved psychological barrier and eventually finds a way to move past it. Once you hit the absolute bottom, there really is nowhere else one can go.
@sykodude Most likely yes, and his new hardcore determination coming through in the song "nothing can stop me now". When you no longer have any barriers holding you back from becoming whatever you want to be, unlimited potential is unlocked. So although an extremely dark and disturbingly depressing scene, the character is coming to terms with this unresolved psychological barrier and eventually finds a way to move past it. Once you hit the absolute bottom, there really is nowhere else one can go.
This is my first post here, so feel free to ignore me because I'm a newbie and, therefor, a complete idiot.
The way I think of this is, the "character" in the album never actually kills himself. He's not that lucky. In both of these last two songs, the suicide is just an idle fantasy that he never goes through with. In "The Downward Spiral," the screams and such are a metaphor for his mad desperation to make the pain go away. In the song "Hurt," he gets his wish; it doesn't hurt anymore. The pain is gone, but he has become so dehumanized that there's nothing else left. He is the living dead.
@sykodude Most likely yes, and his new hardcore determination coming through in the song "nothing can stop me now". When you no longer have any barriers holding you back from becoming whatever you want to be, unlimited potential is unlocked. So although an extremely dark and disturbingly depressing scene, the character is coming to terms with this unresolved psychological barrier and eventually finds a way to move past it. Once you hit the absolute bottom, there really is nowhere else one can go.
@sykodude Most likely yes, and his new hardcore determination coming through in the song "nothing can stop me now". When you no longer have any barriers holding you back from becoming whatever you want to be, unlimited potential is unlocked. So although an extremely dark and disturbingly depressing scene, the character is coming to terms with this unresolved psychological barrier and eventually finds a way to move past it. Once you hit the absolute bottom, there really is nowhere else one can go.