"TRON: Ares" Lyrics

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"TRON: Ares (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)" Soundtrack Description

FAQ

• Is there an official soundtrack album? Yes. TRON: Ares (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) by Nine Inch Nails released on September 19, 2025 via Interscope (with Walt Disney Records and The Null Corporation).
• Who composed the score? Nine Inch Nails — the film’s music is written and produced by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, credited under the band name.
• Which needle-drops (non-NIN songs) appear in the film? Depeche Mode’s “Just Can’t Get Enough,” Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid,” Seals & Crofts’ “Summer Breeze,” and Wendy Carlos’ “Theme from TRON/Tron Scherzo,” among others (according to NME magazine).
• Did the album chart? It debuted at No. 5 on the Billboard 200 and hit No. 1 on four Billboard album charts dated October 4, 2025 (as stated by Billboard).
• Is there a vinyl/CD? Yes — multiple formats (CD, vinyl variants) were issued alongside the digital release.

Notes & Trivia

• First time Reznor & Ross have released a film score officially under the Nine Inch Nails moniker rather than only their personal names.
• The album arrived three weeks before the movie’s U.S. theatrical release on October 10, 2025.
• Legacy nods: Wendy Carlos’ “Theme from TRON” and “Tron Scherzo” appear inside the film — a rare cross-era handshake for the franchise.
• Promo crossover: a limited-time overlay piped new NIN cues into Disney’s TRON Lightcycle Run attraction ahead of release.
• Premiere surprise: NIN and Boys Noize performed outside TCL Chinese Theatre on Oct 6, debuting “Forked Reality” and “Shadow Over Me.”
• Label spine-watchers: U.S. release via Interscope/Disney/Null; Polydor handled the U.K. issue.
• Chart footnote: the album also set a new vinyl sales week for the band.

Overview

Why does an industrial score feel strangely human when the story is about a program learning to live? That’s the trick here: Nine Inch Nails lean into tactility — detuned synths that breathe, percussion that grinds like a 3D printer mid-build — to score a movie about crossing the wire between code and flesh. Reznor and Ross deliberately step away from Legacy’s orchestral muscle and chase something colder, more precise, occasionally abrasive. Yet the album plays like a NIN record you could spin without the visuals: four vocal-forward tracks (“As Alive as You Need Me to Be,” “I Know You Can Feel It,” “Who Wants to Live Forever?,” “Shadow Over Me”) puncture the drones with hooks and ache. Onscreen it behaves like a current — the light-cycle chase, the lab hum, the quiet weight of mortality — and offscreen it’s a late-career flex, folding the band’s Ghosts-era sound design into songs that actually move.

Genres & Themes

• Industrial electronics → machine-rigor for Ares’ engineered body; rhythms feel “printed,” not played.
• Darkwave/synth-pop shadings → bridges to human culture; the Depeche Mode nods signal curiosity instead of menace.
• Ambient dread → the moral fog of weaponized AI; long, airless sustains underscore ethical gray zones.
• Legacy motifs → brief Wendy Carlos cues act as memory pings to TRON’s origin while the palette stays resolutely 2025.

Key Tracks & Scenes

• “Just Can’t Get Enough” — Depeche Mode
  Where it plays: a mid-film moment where Ares and Eve test mutual trust; it surfaces in-world as a character tic rather than a gag.
  Why it matters: it humanizes Ares — a program choosing fizzy ’81 synth-pop is the film’s neatest empathy shortcut.
• “As Alive as You Need Me to Be” — Nine Inch Nails
  Where it plays: heavily featured in marketing and threads through early passages as Ares’ awakening motif.
  Why it matters: the title is practically the thesis: agency, embodiment, consent to exist.
• “Theme from TRON / Tron Scherzo” — Wendy Carlos & London Philharmonic
  Where it plays: a late-film legacy needle-drop; kept vague here to avoid spoilers.
  Why it matters: it re-anchors the franchise history just when the plot’s stakes turn intimate.
• “Paranoid” — Black Sabbath
  Where it plays: a real-world set-piece where chaos and gallows humor collide.
  Why it matters: blunt-force tempo and riff-anxiety mirror the film’s “AI as ordnance” anxiety.
• “Who Wants to Live Forever?” — Nine Inch Nails feat. Judeline
  Where it plays: a reflective passage near the end; non-diegetic.
  Why it matters: the duet frames mortality as choice, not defect — the story’s softest landing.

Music–Story Links (characters & plot beats as connected to songs)

• When Ares finally admits curiosity about human sensation, the Depeche Mode cue doesn’t wink — it chooses. That choice reframes him from tool to agent.
• “As Alive as You Need Me to Be” recurs around scenes where Ares tests limits (speed, strength, disobedience). Each reprise = a wider circle of selfhood.
• Wendy Carlos’ theme lands like a benediction: the franchise blessing a new kind of life entering its canon.
• “Paranoid” drags the film into meatspace — riffs as physiology — right when consequences stop being hypothetical.
• Judeline’s vocal against Reznor’s on “Who Wants to Live Forever?” mirrors the film’s two codes (endless vs. finite) learning to share one body.

How It Was Made (supervision, score, behind-the-scenes)

• Team & crediting: Music by Nine Inch Nails — Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross wrote, produced, programmed, and mixed the score under the band name.
• Sound design stance: No traditional orchestra; the palette favors precision electronics, bit-crushed textures, and physically felt low-end.
• Collaborators: Boys Noize contributes on the single “As Alive as You Need Me to Be”; additional contemporary production touches are scattered across the album.
• Roll-out: The lead single premiered July 17, 2025; Disney spotlighted the score at SDCC and in IMAX-forward trailers.
• Premiere performance: On Oct 6, outside TCL Chinese Theatre, NIN & Boys Noize debuted cues live — a rare red-carpet concert.
• Parks tie-in: Ahead of release, TRON Lightcycle Run briefly swapped to a NIN-scored overlay to seed the new sonic identity.

Reception & Quotes

• Critics praised the music even when the movie split opinion; several called it the franchise’s boldest sonic shift since 2010.
• The album landed Nine Inch Nails back in the Billboard 200 Top 10 and led multiple genre charts its first week.

“Reznor and Ross balance abstraction and aggression.” — Rolling Stone

“A tone-shaping soundtrack that grounds the spectacle.” — Associated Press

“Gaudy, hollow movie; the NIN score still bangs.” — The Times (UK)

“A reflective return — songs that move, not just mood.” — Pitchfork

Sources: Billboard; Pitchfork; The Hollywood Reporter; NME; WDW News Today; Yahoo Entertainment; AllMusic; Associated Press; The Verge; Polydor/Interscope materials.

Technical Info

• Title: TRON: Ares (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
• Year: 2025
• Type: Original score + select vocal tracks
• Composers/Producers: Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross (as Nine Inch Nails)
• Music supervision: Not publicly credited as of Oct 15, 2025
• Labels: Interscope Records; Walt Disney Records; The Null Corporation (Polydor in the U.K.)
• Release: Album out Sept 19, 2025; film U.S. theatrical release Oct 10, 2025
• Notable placements (in-film): Depeche Mode “Just Can’t Get Enough”; Black Sabbath “Paranoid”; Seals & Crofts “Summer Breeze”; Wendy Carlos “Theme from TRON/Tron Scherzo”
• Chart notes: Billboard 200 debut #5; #1 on Top Rock & Alternative Albums, Top Alternative Albums, Top Dance Albums, and Vinyl Albums (week of Oct 4, 2025)
• Formats: Digital, CD, vinyl (multiple variants)
• Availability: Streaming platforms and retail; no full-tracklist reproduced here

Canonical Entities & Relations

Subject	Relation	Object
Nine Inch Nails	composed and performed	TRON: Ares (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Trent Reznor	co-wrote and produced	TRON: Ares (score)
Atticus Ross	co-wrote and produced	TRON: Ares (score)
Wendy Carlos	composed	“Theme from TRON” / “Tron Scherzo”
Walt Disney Pictures	produced	TRON: Ares (film)
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures	distributed	TRON: Ares (film)
Interscope Records	released	TRON: Ares (soundtrack, U.S.)
Polydor Records	released	TRON: Ares (soundtrack, U.K.)
TCL Chinese Theatre	hosted	TRON: Ares world premiere performance (Oct 6, 2025)
Joachim Rønning	directed	TRON: Ares (film)

October, 15th 2025

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