Borland was offered the touring guitarist spot in Nine Inch Nails, and frontman Trent Reznor offered his opinions on the material as it was at the time. He encouraged Borland to "not sing like someone was asleep in the next room" and make it a heavier affair, while coincidentally Borland was changing the material slowly more into that. While the songs were written by Borland, he did have additional input from producer Danny Lohner, the drums were performed by Josh Freese, and the keyboards and additional engineering were assisted by Josh Eustis. After years of working on it when all the participants had free time from their projects, Black Light Burns released their debut album, "Cruel Melody" in the spring of 2007. In its first week of release "Cruel Melody" sold 6,000 copies in the US according to Indiehq.com.