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<blockquote>"Down In It"... That was probably... that was the first song I'd ever written. And I sat down, I took a very experimental approach to it. And the original version I did was about half speed of the one on the record. And it was a total rip-off of "Dig It" by [[Skinny Puppy]]. I'll admit that now. But, um, lyrically, I was just experimenting with just kind of a train-of-thought, writing down whatever I thought and all it was was a kind of... I hate to say what I'm talking about, but I'll do it now, since it's so old I just like to think about it now. It was just this feeling of, like, at an earlier stage of my life I thought I had my act together, I thought I knew what I wanted to do. I thought, and thought I had pride in myself, and as I'd gotten older, and realized that certain things don't work out the way you hoped they would at a certain stage and a lot of the illusions you had been led to believe growing up in a fairly sheltered environment... Just, I dunno, I was kind of coming of age, realizing that, you know, things might not work out sort of feeling. That's kind of the bridge of the song.</blockquote>
At some point in the early 90s, Reznor was approached about licensing a track for a Gatorade commercial. When he rejected this proposal, the company hired someone to record was using a "Down In It" soundalike tracksong, and Reznor looked into the possibility of suing them.[https://www.theninhotline.net/archives/articles/display/598]
==Appearances==
Leaked in 2025. The leak stated: "this early mix was included on an internal tape of ''Pretty Hate Machine'' made in the [[TVT Records|TVT]] offices in 1989. As the rest of the tape contained final mixes, it is thought to be the originally intended version to appear on the album, referred to by Trent Reznor as the 'original mix' in a March 1990 ''Alternative Press'' interview." This seems to line up with a 1995 article from ''Musician'' magazine[https://www.theninhotline.net/archives/articles/display/614] which states that LeBlanc had done pre-production work on "Down In It" before it was handed over to Adrian Sherwood.
This version begins with a short beat containing the hi-hat and kick drum with a bit of synth work before the kick drum continues on, with the main synth melody beginning the album version. This is then followed by a stripped-back first verse similar to the demo version from the "Head Like a Hole" single, before progressing similarly to the final/"Skin" version.
===Down In It (Demo from ''Head Like A Hole'')===