Something I Can Never Have

Trent Reznor co-produced the track in London with John Fryer, although Reznor "kind of backed away" from it. He felt that Fryer's production gave the track a "dreamy quality", as the piano is heavily filtered and features a large amount of reverb. The track also features elements of unused backing tracks by This Mortal Coil, a music collective that Fryer was part of; while these were initially included by accident, both Reznor and Fryer felt they fit well in the track.^[7]

Following the song's main topic, Reznor struggled with depression during the five years following the release of The Downward Spiral in 1994;^[8] his health worsened when he began abusing alcohol, cocaine, and other drugs, before completing rehab in 2001.^[8] He also had suicidal tendencies due to these issues.^[9] In a 2005 interview, Reznor stated that he was "pretty happy".^[9]

Tom Breihan from Pitchfork Media gave a positive review to the song, stating that the song portrays "an absolute mastery" with "its haunted, minimal piano figure and a few hushed synth tones slowly, letting in sputtering static, faraway door-slam drums, and quiet little counter-melodies."^[2] When the song was re-released in 2006, Rob Mitchum referred to it as a "'Goodbye Blue Sky' rip-off".^[10] In 2020, Kerrang! and Billboard ranked the song number seven and number five, respectively, on their lists of the greatest Nine Inch Nails songs.^[11][12]

In July 2014, Tori Amos covered the song on her Unrepentant Geraldines Tour.^[13] A version of the song was used in the fifth episode of the HBO series Westworld in 2016.^[14]