Ok, I'll be honest here. I havent opened this album, since I got the music for free from nin.com. I got this physical CD as a collectors item only. I've also watched all the rehearsal videos on YouTube, etc, and they are all top notch. The only thing I havent seen is the booklet and the stickers, but this thing is staying sealed.

Trent Reznor released this album for free on his website, which I immediately downloaded. It has quickly become one of my favorite NIN albums. To show my appreciation for his contribution to music, I decided to buy the physical album as well, and gave it as a gift (of course I will borrow it... it has some DVD extras that i want to watch)

IT'S RARE THAT WE WOULD USE THE WORD DISTURBING AS A COMPLIMENT BUT 'THE SLIP' IS BEAUTIFULLY DISTURBING. THE 'NINERS' ARE AN INTELECTUALLY AND EMOTIONALLY DANGEROUS BAND, NOY THE GREATEST BAND OF ALL TIME BUT THEY CERTAINLY DESERVE TO REIGN AS SUCH FOR A WEEK !!!!!

I have been a NIN fan since he came out. I just can't seem to love this album as much as the rest. It's got great sounds and the lyrics are good too.. just doesn't strike a cord with me. The concert was fantastic though! Don't miss it.

(This is a review of the product itself, not the music..)

Great album, not the strongest of Reznor's, but one of his most outright heavy efforts since "Broken" and a welcome follow up to Year Zero. Be warned, however, that the copy I received has a distinct warp on one edge of the vinyl. Although I should have learned my lesson after getting 5 warped copies of "With Teeth" from Amazon earlier this year I still clicked "buy" and took my chances. Due to returning what feels like too many warped LPs I just gave up on returning this one and am instead dealing with the frantic jumping of my sub-woofers from the first track on each side. It certainly doesn't help that this record has such a low volume in comparison to nearly everything else I own so it must be CRANKED to a ridiculous degree to get as wonderfully loud as the CD or digital download versions. I should feel like a sucker for buying a "free" album in the first place... this is the only NIN vinyl I regret purchasing. Music is great, packaging is gorgeous, sound transfer to vinyl is just "alright" (even at 180 Grams), and the product is borderline defective. Question to Amazon: "How are you storing these?!?!" Stick with the FLAC lossless available from nin.com. It's free and sounds superior to this usually mind blowing format. There is quite a bit of surface noise on the disc as well, likely due to having to turn it up so much. A few pops on first spin as well. I have decent equipment, so this is rather annoying.
This may not be news to you, prospoective buyer, but some digital recordings just don't translate well to vinyl. Bjork's "Vespertine" has hissing on the vocal "S" sounds, fuzzy hi-hats and distorted chimes. No good. Another recent Nine Inch Nails release, "Y34rz3r0r3m1x3d" translated wonderfully, having gorgeous range and depth with rich lows and crisp highs.
"The Slip" is more or less in the middle of those two examples in the way of transfer quality. Tolerable but not great.
If you're a hardcore collector then I suppose there is no swaying you. For a casual nin/vinyl enthusiast, I wouldn't recommend this music on this format merely on the grounds it just doesn't pound the same way the other formats do. Hope that helps someone out there.