On 19 September 2025, Interscope Records will release ‘TRON: Ares’ (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack), featuring brand new original music by NINE INCH NAILS. Composed for the third instalment of the groundbreaking ‘TRON’ film franchise, ‘TRON: Ares’ emerges as one of the most striking NINE INCH NAILS records to date - a menacing, pulsating work full of melancholy and dynamism, where analogue soul collides with digital dread. It also marks the band’s first official film score - despite Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross having already composed 20 scores under their own names, earning two Oscars, three Golden Globes, a GRAMMY®, and an Emmy Award in the process. In this exclusive Empire feature, Reznor explains why the duo approached ‘TRON: Ares’ as a Nine Inch Nails project.
‘TRON: Ares’ (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) is available to pre-order now. The full tracklist is listed below.
Today, NINE INCH NAILS also unveiled the album’s first single: ‘As Alive As You Need Me To Be.’ This marks the band’s first new music in five years. The track also features in the newly released ‘TRON: Ares’ trailer, available to watch now. Disney’s TRON: Ares will be released in German cinemas on 9 October 2025.
Tracklist
01. Init
02. Forked Reality
03. As Alive As You Need Me To Be
04. Echoes
05. This Changes Everything
06. In The Image Of
07. I Know You Can Feel It
08. Permanence
09. Infiltrator
10. 100% Expendable
11. Still Remains
12. Who Wants To Live Forever?
13. Building Better Worlds
14. Target Identified
15. Daemonize
16. Empathetic Response
17. What Have You Done?
18. A Question Of Trust
19. Ghost In The Machine
20. No Going Back
21. Nemesis
22. New Directive
23. Out In The World
24. Shadow Over Me
Just a few weeks ago, NINE INCH NAILS were touring Europe on their “Peel It Back” World Tour, playing critically acclaimed shows in Berlin and Cologne, among others. NME described the performance as “a revelation” and “a thrilling onslaught that combined angst, sincerity and a nightmarish otherworldliness...” The band resumes their North American tour on 6 August.
Founded in 1988 by Trent Reznor, NINE INCH NAILS are widely regarded as one of the most innovative and influential acts in modern music. Known for fusing elements of Industrial, Electronic, Rock, and Ambient into emotionally raw, aggressive compositions, the band has won two GRAMMY® Awards and was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2020. Their 1989 debut ‘Pretty Hate Machine’, alongside landmark follow-ups ‘The Downward Spiral’ (1994) and ‘The Fragile’ (1999), all achieved multi-platinum status. The latter gave NINE INCH NAILS their first No.1 on the Billboard 200, a feat they repeated in 2005 with ‘With Teeth’.
In 2008, Reznor and Ross began their film scoring career. Their first project, David Fincher’s The Social Network, earned them both an Oscar and a Golden Globe. Since then, they have composed music for a wide range of film and television projects. For the HBO series ‘Watchmen’, they received the Emmy for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series, while their work on Pixar’s 2020 animated film ‘Soul’ garnered them another Oscar, GRAMMY®, Golden Globe, and a BAFTA. Further nominations followed for David Fincher’s ‘Mank’. More recently, Reznor and Ross have scored Sam Mendes’ ‘Empire of Light’, Fincher’s ‘The Killer’, and three films by Luca Guadagnino - ‘Bones and All’, ‘Challengers’, and ‘Queer’.
Earlier this year, Reznor and Ross announced ‘Future Ruins’, a one-day music festival they are curating. Featuring live performances across three stages, the festival celebrates visionary composers shaping the sound of modern cinema and television, with some sets accompanied by a live orchestra. ‘Future Ruins’ takes place on 8 November at the Equestrian Center in Los Angeles, offering visitors a chance to experience not only the pioneering work of the duo but also that of their peers - not as background music, but as the main event. Here, the music tells the story. Tickets are on sale now at FutureRuins.com.
As a NINE INCH NAILS project, ‘TRON: Ares’ marks a departure from their previous scores. This is sonic architecture: pulsating synths, distorted textures, haunting melodies. Not a single second of orchestration. Instead, the album fully unleashes the raw power of NINE INCH NAILS - a redefinition of what film music can be.
Source: Press Release
