Changes

| versions =The Only Time<br>The Only Time (Demo - ''[[Purest Feeling (halo)|Purest Feeling]]'')<br>The Only Time (''[[Closure]]'')

*Engineering: John Fryer, Keith LeBlanc, [[Kennan Keating]], [[Ken Quartarone]]

This is the final album version. The track begins with Reznor's vocal and a bass line that sounds like a keyboard slap bass preset. As the verse moves along, a minimal and sleek-sounding drum track gradually comes in. Near the end of the first verse, there is a very brief appearance of [[samples|sampled]] background vocals recorded for "So Alive" by Love And Rockets (a track also produced by John Fryer.) As the chorus kicks in, the bass switches to a more picked bass guitar sound, the drum track becomes much louder and more aggressive and the low-pitched "Down In It" synth voice comes in, playing an ascending melody. During the second half of the chorus, the instrumentation of the verse returns, and the high-pitched "Down In It" synth voice comes in. The song continues on in much the same pattern, with minor variances. A distorted guitar overdub in the instrumental end of the song segues directly into "[[Ringfinger]]."

===The Only Time (Demo- ''Purest Feeling'')===An early version of the song found on [[Purest Feeling (halo)|''Purest Feeling]]''.

This live version begins with Reznor explaining that "this is a song about fucking."This version features a heavy guitar riff added during the second verse, as well as an aggressive bridge section with more heavy guitar and a descending synth melody.