i've decided to upload a drum machine mix of this after all. this is a brand new mix, dated to today.
initially written in 1997. recreated in jan, 1998. a failed rescue was
attempted in 2013. reclaimed july 1, 2015. deconstructed dec 18, 2015.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/takers
Friday, December 18, 2015
finalizing use value is somewhat difficult to define in the human propensity towards artistic expression
i'm closing this track, as well. no change from the initial upload.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/use-value-is-somewhat-difficult-to-define-in-the-human-propensity-towards-artistic-expression
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/use-value-is-somewhat-difficult-to-define-in-the-human-propensity-towards-artistic-expression
god, my brain hurts.
you know what? i know where the baltics are. i can identify each of them on a map. i know their capital cities. i know which language groups their dominant ethnicities fall into. and, i even know a fair bit of their history.
but, i don't have a favourite one. because that's really NOT a thing.
well, maybe prussia. it's them hats. but that would be a confusing answer.
i don't have a favourite balkan, favourite korea or favourite caribbean island, either.
i really hope the stupidity stops, soon. the canadian media is making fox news look insightful, right now.
this isn't tabloid quality journalism. it's closer to onion quality journalism.
...and it's sinking the conservatives to an ontario pc party level of amateurism. suddenly, they're more humorous than scary.
do they really think people can't work this out? really?
globalnews.ca/news/2409408/baltics-a-thing-because-its-2015/
Jane tow
Good for you Jessica, you sound like a very intelligent young lady. I hope one day you are PM!!
jessica amber murray
that's a good laugh.
maybe i should address this point. i've been rambling enough places that i think i have a passive audience. just a feeling. maybe paranoia, maybe solipsism - but maybe accurate. it's at least as likely, really, isn't it?
the idea of me running for office right now is really something that ought to be explained in the terms of a comic strip, with hilarious hijinks leading to total failure along the way. but, even if it weren't such an outrageously ludicrous proposition, the reality is that i wish my focus was 100% on music production at the moment. hear me out on this.
so, i've been dealing with radio interference in my head phones since july. since then, canada has been through an election and i've been kind of vocal about it. but, it was totally by the accident that my system was malfunctioning, and i had absolutely no idea why.
it took me forever to figure it out. first, i had to check things like drivers and system files, as it's the most likely option. that took months to rule out entirely, and i wasn't helped by the fact that i had two sets of headphones, both, it turns out, with shorts. so, every time i checked for issues with the phones, it was always "either the equipment is faulty, or both my phones are faulty.". and, you always take the odds on that gamble - you always say the equipment is faulty.
but, then i finally realized it had to be electrical. so, you have to check everything that could be creating interference. in a room full of gear, that's a nightmare. eventually, i realized that i was getting the same noise out of an mp3 player as i was getting out of the grid - indicating that the interference had to be in the air, as the mp3 player is not connected to the grid.
so, then i had to check to see how far i could go with this interference, realizing it has boundaries that are blocks away - meaning the interference is broadly environmental, and not coming from inside the unit. but, in the process i found the short in one pair of the phones. then, maybe both pairs had shorts, after all.
so, i think the shorts in my phones are interacting with the environmental field to turn my phones into radio antennas, and i'm picking up the local am radio signals. this isn't creating the sound of a radio station, it's just making the audio sound like am radio - kind of jagged and rough at the edges.
it turns out i can block the radio signals relatively well using tinfoil.
but, it took me six long months of experiments to get me this far. and, i'd never had taken the time to ramble on the internet, if it weren't to vent frustration about not knowing why i can't be done mixing this project by now.
that said, i might think about it. one day. in the exceedingly distant future. under certain unlikely conditions. so, it's not likely. but note that i have thought about how unlikely it is on more than one occasion.
you know what? i know where the baltics are. i can identify each of them on a map. i know their capital cities. i know which language groups their dominant ethnicities fall into. and, i even know a fair bit of their history.
but, i don't have a favourite one. because that's really NOT a thing.
well, maybe prussia. it's them hats. but that would be a confusing answer.
i don't have a favourite balkan, favourite korea or favourite caribbean island, either.
i really hope the stupidity stops, soon. the canadian media is making fox news look insightful, right now.
this isn't tabloid quality journalism. it's closer to onion quality journalism.
...and it's sinking the conservatives to an ontario pc party level of amateurism. suddenly, they're more humorous than scary.
do they really think people can't work this out? really?
globalnews.ca/news/2409408/baltics-a-thing-because-its-2015/
Jane tow
Good for you Jessica, you sound like a very intelligent young lady. I hope one day you are PM!!
jessica amber murray
that's a good laugh.
maybe i should address this point. i've been rambling enough places that i think i have a passive audience. just a feeling. maybe paranoia, maybe solipsism - but maybe accurate. it's at least as likely, really, isn't it?
the idea of me running for office right now is really something that ought to be explained in the terms of a comic strip, with hilarious hijinks leading to total failure along the way. but, even if it weren't such an outrageously ludicrous proposition, the reality is that i wish my focus was 100% on music production at the moment. hear me out on this.
so, i've been dealing with radio interference in my head phones since july. since then, canada has been through an election and i've been kind of vocal about it. but, it was totally by the accident that my system was malfunctioning, and i had absolutely no idea why.
it took me forever to figure it out. first, i had to check things like drivers and system files, as it's the most likely option. that took months to rule out entirely, and i wasn't helped by the fact that i had two sets of headphones, both, it turns out, with shorts. so, every time i checked for issues with the phones, it was always "either the equipment is faulty, or both my phones are faulty.". and, you always take the odds on that gamble - you always say the equipment is faulty.
but, then i finally realized it had to be electrical. so, you have to check everything that could be creating interference. in a room full of gear, that's a nightmare. eventually, i realized that i was getting the same noise out of an mp3 player as i was getting out of the grid - indicating that the interference had to be in the air, as the mp3 player is not connected to the grid.
so, then i had to check to see how far i could go with this interference, realizing it has boundaries that are blocks away - meaning the interference is broadly environmental, and not coming from inside the unit. but, in the process i found the short in one pair of the phones. then, maybe both pairs had shorts, after all.
so, i think the shorts in my phones are interacting with the environmental field to turn my phones into radio antennas, and i'm picking up the local am radio signals. this isn't creating the sound of a radio station, it's just making the audio sound like am radio - kind of jagged and rough at the edges.
it turns out i can block the radio signals relatively well using tinfoil.
but, it took me six long months of experiments to get me this far. and, i'd never had taken the time to ramble on the internet, if it weren't to vent frustration about not knowing why i can't be done mixing this project by now.
that said, i might think about it. one day. in the exceedingly distant future. under certain unlikely conditions. so, it's not likely. but note that i have thought about how unlikely it is on more than one occasion.
Thursday, December 17, 2015
finalizing there is definitely something wrong with ironic hipster homophobia
ok.
so, i still don't know if the ultimate problem here is the short or the interference, but i've found a short on the left side of my phones. and, i'm not sure if it's in the cord or in the phones, either.
i know that an extra bit of foil around the connector between the cable and the phones seems to have me fully shielded.
i am finalizing track four, as of right now. it hasn't been altered since june.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/there-is-definitely-something-wrong-with-ironic-hipster-homophobia
so, i still don't know if the ultimate problem here is the short or the interference, but i've found a short on the left side of my phones. and, i'm not sure if it's in the cord or in the phones, either.
i know that an extra bit of foil around the connector between the cable and the phones seems to have me fully shielded.
i am finalizing track four, as of right now. it hasn't been altered since june.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/there-is-definitely-something-wrong-with-ironic-hipster-homophobia
i actually shielded the phones with aluminum foil and it seems to have worked.
i'll have to go get some phones next week. that will tell me if i have a short in the cable, or if the interference in here is just really strong.
in the mean time, i think i can actually finally get some work done over the weekend. fingers crossed.
i'll have to go get some phones next week. that will tell me if i have a short in the cable, or if the interference in here is just really strong.
in the mean time, i think i can actually finally get some work done over the weekend. fingers crossed.
obligatory influential...
i tend to consistently go back to pisces over siamese dream in terms of influence. i think part of the reason is that the guitars in the rock songs are so much rawer, and the lullabies are so much lusher. i think this record is really the most alternative record that corgan ever did - the pop and metal influences are tuned down a little in favour of gazier and punkier leanings. i know it's an outtakes disc, but i really think it's the band's best record.
there's some nice raw guitar playing all over this disc, but what i'm really citing is the total abandon on pissant and hello kitty kat. i used to do the old rewind, play, repeat trick on those two for hours.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
i tend to consistently go back to pisces over siamese dream in terms of influence. i think part of the reason is that the guitars in the rock songs are so much rawer, and the lullabies are so much lusher. i think this record is really the most alternative record that corgan ever did - the pop and metal influences are tuned down a little in favour of gazier and punkier leanings. i know it's an outtakes disc, but i really think it's the band's best record.
there's some nice raw guitar playing all over this disc, but what i'm really citing is the total abandon on pissant and hello kitty kat. i used to do the old rewind, play, repeat trick on those two for hours.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
obligatory influential...
as far as guitar records go, this is really near the top of the pile. and, it's near the top of the influence list, too. i remember listening to old bootlegs of cornell ribbing thayil a little about going into a "guitar trance". and, there's some real truth to it. there's a nice guitar trance in fell on black days, and another in superunknown.
i used to play along to a lot of grunge-ish records over '94-'96ish, before i started writing my own stuff. the two bands that were always the most fun were soundgarden and the smashing pumpkins. it wasn't so complex that you had to sit down and think about it, but it was acrobatic enough that you couldn't zone out in it, either. good middle point...
what i'm citing here is the guitar trance. it's a good 80% thayil, here.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
as far as guitar records go, this is really near the top of the pile. and, it's near the top of the influence list, too. i remember listening to old bootlegs of cornell ribbing thayil a little about going into a "guitar trance". and, there's some real truth to it. there's a nice guitar trance in fell on black days, and another in superunknown.
i used to play along to a lot of grunge-ish records over '94-'96ish, before i started writing my own stuff. the two bands that were always the most fun were soundgarden and the smashing pumpkins. it wasn't so complex that you had to sit down and think about it, but it was acrobatic enough that you couldn't zone out in it, either. good middle point...
what i'm citing here is the guitar trance. it's a good 80% thayil, here.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
obligatory influential...
i tend to consistently go back to pisces over siamese dream in terms of influence. i think part of the reason is that the guitars in the rock songs are so much rawer, and the lullabies are so much lusher. i think this record is really the most alternative record that corgan ever did - the pop and metal influences are tuned down a little in favour of gazier and punkier leanings. i know it's an outtakes disc, but i really think it's the band's best record.
there's some nice raw guitar playing all over this disc, but what i'm really citing is the total abandon on pissant and hello kitty kat. i used to do the old rewind, play, repeat trick on those two for hours.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
i tend to consistently go back to pisces over siamese dream in terms of influence. i think part of the reason is that the guitars in the rock songs are so much rawer, and the lullabies are so much lusher. i think this record is really the most alternative record that corgan ever did - the pop and metal influences are tuned down a little in favour of gazier and punkier leanings. i know it's an outtakes disc, but i really think it's the band's best record.
there's some nice raw guitar playing all over this disc, but what i'm really citing is the total abandon on pissant and hello kitty kat. i used to do the old rewind, play, repeat trick on those two for hours.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
obligatory influential...
i sometimes forget that i listened to huge amounts of 'pop' over '97 and '98. u2 is like wallpaper, right - it's just always there. sometimes you forget about it. but, when you remember, it becomes obvious.
i think it's universally agreed at this point that this was their last solid disc, but i'm not sure how many people really listened to it closely. it's more just that, on reflection, you have to include it - because the decrease in quality that happened afterwards is so dramatic. it's a really, clear, unambiguous cut-off. it's either that you cut off after pop or before achtung baby, and nobody wants to cut off before achtung baby - so zooropa and pop get included as this kind of afterthought.
i suppose i was the rare weird kid that actually listened to both of those discs quite a bit, and actually took quite a bit of influence from both of them. the late 90s were my industrial kick. i grew up with u2. the transition may not have made sense to most people, but it made a lot of sense to me; that is, the demographic they were angling for did exist, even if we weren't dominant.
the edge used a lot of flangers over this period, which is something i really picked up on. i know a lot of people hate that synthetic tone, but i've always loved the idea of making your guitar sound like any weird sound you can conjure out of it.
i was hoping i'd get another good record out of them, eventually. even if it took a while. it really seems unlikely at this point.
(relevant tracks: why, on sexual confusion in adolescence, thug culture is enforced by the media from the top down and the entirety of period 1.2 (98-99))
i sometimes forget that i listened to huge amounts of 'pop' over '97 and '98. u2 is like wallpaper, right - it's just always there. sometimes you forget about it. but, when you remember, it becomes obvious.
i think it's universally agreed at this point that this was their last solid disc, but i'm not sure how many people really listened to it closely. it's more just that, on reflection, you have to include it - because the decrease in quality that happened afterwards is so dramatic. it's a really, clear, unambiguous cut-off. it's either that you cut off after pop or before achtung baby, and nobody wants to cut off before achtung baby - so zooropa and pop get included as this kind of afterthought.
i suppose i was the rare weird kid that actually listened to both of those discs quite a bit, and actually took quite a bit of influence from both of them. the late 90s were my industrial kick. i grew up with u2. the transition may not have made sense to most people, but it made a lot of sense to me; that is, the demographic they were angling for did exist, even if we weren't dominant.
the edge used a lot of flangers over this period, which is something i really picked up on. i know a lot of people hate that synthetic tone, but i've always loved the idea of making your guitar sound like any weird sound you can conjure out of it.
i was hoping i'd get another good record out of them, eventually. even if it took a while. it really seems unlikely at this point.
(relevant tracks: why, on sexual confusion in adolescence, thug culture is enforced by the media from the top down and the entirety of period 1.2 (98-99))
obligatory influential...
i tend to consistently go back to pisces over siamese dream in terms of influence. i think part of the reason is that the guitars in the rock songs are so much rawer, and the lullabies are so much lusher. i think this record is really the most alternative record that corgan ever did - the pop and metal influences are tuned down a little in favour of gazier and punkier leanings. i know it's an outtakes disc, but i really think it's the band's best record.
there's some nice raw guitar playing all over this disc, but what i'm really citing is the total abandon on pissant and hello kitty kat. i used to do the old rewind, play, repeat trick on those two for hours.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
i tend to consistently go back to pisces over siamese dream in terms of influence. i think part of the reason is that the guitars in the rock songs are so much rawer, and the lullabies are so much lusher. i think this record is really the most alternative record that corgan ever did - the pop and metal influences are tuned down a little in favour of gazier and punkier leanings. i know it's an outtakes disc, but i really think it's the band's best record.
there's some nice raw guitar playing all over this disc, but what i'm really citing is the total abandon on pissant and hello kitty kat. i used to do the old rewind, play, repeat trick on those two for hours.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
+deathtokoalas
and, i'm going to pop an obligatory influential in, here, too.
this record is another lost classic, in it's merging of the various historical chicago sounds - industrial, yes, but also a lot of hip-hop and a lot of jazz, along with a bit of a punk perspective. excepting the fact that the wax trax sound was obviously influential on reznor, saying it sounds like nin is really pretty much wrong. it sounds more like a mash-up of miles davis and the beastie boys, and could reasonably be seen as a substantial forerunner to flying lotus - that's certainly more of the right genre, anyways. the thing is that that genre didn't really exist in 1995. it's one of those examples of a very forward thinking disc going over everybody's heads and being forgotten. that happened a lot in the 90s.....so often, that it seems like people stopped making forward-thinking discs, because it was just going to go over everybody's heads.
i've been struggling to figure out where i was approaching the track from, lyrically. i've never listened to a lot of hip-hop, but i was definitely listening to a lot of die warzau. the record hits similar themes of being "liberated" from the political spectrum. so, i think this record is probably about the right thing to cite in terms of the unusual beat-boxing in the track.
(relevant tracks: why)
and, i'm going to pop an obligatory influential in, here, too.
this record is another lost classic, in it's merging of the various historical chicago sounds - industrial, yes, but also a lot of hip-hop and a lot of jazz, along with a bit of a punk perspective. excepting the fact that the wax trax sound was obviously influential on reznor, saying it sounds like nin is really pretty much wrong. it sounds more like a mash-up of miles davis and the beastie boys, and could reasonably be seen as a substantial forerunner to flying lotus - that's certainly more of the right genre, anyways. the thing is that that genre didn't really exist in 1995. it's one of those examples of a very forward thinking disc going over everybody's heads and being forgotten. that happened a lot in the 90s.....so often, that it seems like people stopped making forward-thinking discs, because it was just going to go over everybody's heads.
i've been struggling to figure out where i was approaching the track from, lyrically. i've never listened to a lot of hip-hop, but i was definitely listening to a lot of die warzau. the record hits similar themes of being "liberated" from the political spectrum. so, i think this record is probably about the right thing to cite in terms of the unusual beat-boxing in the track.
(relevant tracks: why)
obligatory influential...
as far as guitar records go, this is really near the top of the pile. and, it's near the top of the influence list, too. i remember listening to old bootlegs of cornell ribbing thayil a little about going into a "guitar trance". and, there's some real truth to it. there's a nice guitar trance in fell on black days, and another in superunknown.
i used to play along to a lot of grunge-ish records over '94-'96ish, before i started writing my own stuff. the two bands that were always the most fun were soundgarden and the smashing pumpkins. it wasn't so complex that you had to sit down and think about it, but it was acrobatic enough that you couldn't zone out in it, either. good middle point...
what i'm citing here is the guitar trance. it's a good 80% thayil, here.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
as far as guitar records go, this is really near the top of the pile. and, it's near the top of the influence list, too. i remember listening to old bootlegs of cornell ribbing thayil a little about going into a "guitar trance". and, there's some real truth to it. there's a nice guitar trance in fell on black days, and another in superunknown.
i used to play along to a lot of grunge-ish records over '94-'96ish, before i started writing my own stuff. the two bands that were always the most fun were soundgarden and the smashing pumpkins. it wasn't so complex that you had to sit down and think about it, but it was acrobatic enough that you couldn't zone out in it, either. good middle point...
what i'm citing here is the guitar trance. it's a good 80% thayil, here.
(relevant tracks: why, first movement, and really whenever i lose myself on the guitar...)
i'm laughing that this showed up in my play next list, because i always thought fla were basically unlistenable garbage and that they destroyed industrial music & culture - but this is the one song i could kind of dig.
strangely, i like a lot of what delerium did. but, fla has always been this ridiculously macho cyborg dickhead shit. and, the only reason this is at all tolerable is that it delves into self-parody. you can't help but burst out laughing, as arnold comes in and growls...
THE LAWS OF NATURE
THE LAWS OF MAN
THE VOLATILE PARADOX WILL NEVER STAND
wait. these are different things? paradox? how?
strangely, i like a lot of what delerium did. but, fla has always been this ridiculously macho cyborg dickhead shit. and, the only reason this is at all tolerable is that it delves into self-parody. you can't help but burst out laughing, as arnold comes in and growls...
THE LAWS OF NATURE
THE LAWS OF MAN
THE VOLATILE PARADOX WILL NEVER STAND
wait. these are different things? paradox? how?
obligatory influential...
i remember the first time i heard this, some time in early '98; i just stopped and melted. it was literally hypnotizing. i couldn't even get up to smoke a joint, i had to wait until it was done.
none of the other syrs follow up on this well, but this one is really magical. total must-listen.
(relevant tracks: why, liquify and everything else from 98 on)
i remember the first time i heard this, some time in early '98; i just stopped and melted. it was literally hypnotizing. i couldn't even get up to smoke a joint, i had to wait until it was done.
none of the other syrs follow up on this well, but this one is really magical. total must-listen.
(relevant tracks: why, liquify and everything else from 98 on)
deathtokoalas
obligatory influential...
i picked up a cassette of fixed some time around '94 or so. at first, i couldn't listen to it. it was just noise. but, i kept coming back to it out of a sense of curiosity: is there something to this under the chaos? is this something abstract i ought to understand? or is it really just a lot of noise?
it finally clicked some time in mid '95 or so, and it got stuck in my walkman after that for months and months at a time. i actually managed to literally wear the tape out, and had to repurchase on cd.
i'm not sure i've ever really got an answer to that question, so much as it acted as a means of familiarizing myself with the concept of noise as music. about half the disc is carefully sculpted and arranged. the thirlwell mixes, especially, are definitely works of art. but, there's also a good helping of total noise on the disc that exists on a kind of boundary point. if you listen to it repeatedly, patterns start to arise and you become familiar with them, meaning it does function as artistically valid from start to finish. but, it's an open question as to whether those patterns were composed or just haphazardly spliced together. the thing is that it's not obvious, either way - there is at the very least an expert level of bullshitting going on here, to the point that the question can be put aside and the record can be thoroughly enjoyed as purely abstract sound.
it's a pretty ubiquitous background influence, along with the other major nin remix discs (closer & fdts, especially). but, it really comes out very strongly on the current featured track.
(relevant tracks: why is the current featured track with the obvious influence, but fixed is a formative influence and can be heard in everything i've ever done)
Nacht Schreck
NIN's best release, without a doubt.
Wes Murray
+Nacht Schreck Not the best, IMO, but definitely overlooked and underrated. Broken & Fixed are both gems that rarely get the attention they deserve.
deathtokoalas
+Nacht Schreck i think it's without a doubt in the top tier, along with the full-length closer single and further down the spiral - and maybe the perfect drug single. motp would make the top tier, too, if it was a bit longer. also, quake. but, i think it's hard to be more specific than that.
the best material was without a doubt the remix compilations between halo 6 and 11. 5 & 8 were the best proper records, so you could maybe claim the classic period was 5-11, but they're not on the same level.
Jacob French
+Nacht Schreck The Fragile is the best, easily. Broken and Fixed were basically prototypes for TDS, and TDS served as the prelude to The Fragile.
deathtokoalas
+Jacob French for brevity, i'll let the statement stand. but, intent and outcome are not the same thing; the reality is that the fragile was an artistic failure, due largely to the lyrics and the lack of development around the album's release. a strong remix suite would have helped a lot. but, what the listener actually got was a string of half developed songs with vocals that were dragged down so far by alcoholism that they are borderline autistic. the drugs actually seemed to help him in his composition, but they had the effect of really legitimately ruining the songs through the lyrics.
i can't imagine how any halfways intelligent person could listen to the record and not deduce that he's gone full retard. because he actually did - he drank himself stupid, and the record is the consequence of it.
and that's the actual truth of it.
like i say - he could have saved the period with a strong remix set. but, what we got seemed haphazardly thrown together in a drunken haze.
Jacob French
That's what's so good about it, it's literally the morning after Trent's success of TDS. He spent all that time with destructive songs that when he tries to rebuild some semblance of his sound back up again, all he gets is this fragile haze of mixed messages.
The Wretched completely embodies his feelings about the album as a whole, it's not supposed to feel like this complete destruction in vein of Broken or TDS. It's the aftermath of the complete destruction, where Trent is just trying anything to glue his music together. That's what makes it such a perfect concept album along with TDS, it isn't supposed to sound super-polished or like some stereotypical finale to what Trent's career has been so far. He destroys his own music with TDS and The Fragile is Trent seeing if anything is left to begin again from, and in my opinion there is.
But I'm curious, what would you name NIN's best album?
deathtokoalas
+Jacob French that's the kind of rationalization people throw around at velvet underground records - this idea that it's lacklustre on purpose, and therefore brilliant. it's reaching, to say the least.
i think you've got the process drastically wrong, as well. see, here's the thing: there's an original version of the fragile that was never released and was never leaked (to my knowledge). the record label wouldn't allow it. i suspect that it's probably brilliant - and features a lot of writing that is similar to the still ep. but, he caved.
polished or not polished is a sort of ridiculous way to describe his work - it's all polished. even the nastiest, most grating parts of it. but, the record was definitely altered for mass appeal by people that weren't trent reznor. and, that is a big part of the reason it doesn't hold up.
don't get me wrong: there's enough material, there. a fully instrumental single record would have been an incredible kick to the head. and, a couple of the ballads are worth saving. but, pretty much all of the traditional "rock songs" seem written down to a caricature of his audience, under extreme pressure to produce a marketable product. you have to understand that what we got is not what was intended, and we may never hear the intended record.
in the end, the label executives won - they wanted with teeth. whatever. i'd just like to hear the actual record.
Donkey Kong
+deathtokoalas Where did you hear that?
deathtokoalas
+Donkey Kong well, i lived through the process. it was well understood. i don't remember sources from 20 years ago, but they were mainstream - look at stuff like rolling stone or spin.
he had a completely different record prepared that was more "serious", but the label rejected it and sent him back to make more hard-hitting rock songs and radio-friendly singles.
ironically, that's the reason people reacted so badly to it. it's a lot of recycled ideas (and he's still recycling those ideas). and, it's a lot of pandering to an imagined demographic. over time, what's happened is that his initial fan base has moved out and a new fan base that reflects that imagined demographic has moved in.
remember: nin fans in the 90s weren't much into rock or metal. they were mostly into techno and "industrial"; where it interfaced with rock was more in various types of post-punk. you'd have been more likely to find a nin fan into public enemy than into tool. so, it's a huge turnover in his fan base. the fragile is a kind of a pivot point, in that respect.
i pointed out elsewhere that i consider the still ep to be his last substantial release under the nin moniker. and, rumours have long been floating around that this material was initially meant for the fragile. it certainly fits the description of the rejected material, anyways, and is a good feel for what the record was intended to sound like.
==
Aydin Matney
screaming slave sounds like a death grips song
deathtokoalas
+Aydin Matney not really. but you should check out the ice cube remix of i'm afraid of americans. it's everything death grips wish they could have been
obligatory influential...
i picked up a cassette of fixed some time around '94 or so. at first, i couldn't listen to it. it was just noise. but, i kept coming back to it out of a sense of curiosity: is there something to this under the chaos? is this something abstract i ought to understand? or is it really just a lot of noise?
it finally clicked some time in mid '95 or so, and it got stuck in my walkman after that for months and months at a time. i actually managed to literally wear the tape out, and had to repurchase on cd.
i'm not sure i've ever really got an answer to that question, so much as it acted as a means of familiarizing myself with the concept of noise as music. about half the disc is carefully sculpted and arranged. the thirlwell mixes, especially, are definitely works of art. but, there's also a good helping of total noise on the disc that exists on a kind of boundary point. if you listen to it repeatedly, patterns start to arise and you become familiar with them, meaning it does function as artistically valid from start to finish. but, it's an open question as to whether those patterns were composed or just haphazardly spliced together. the thing is that it's not obvious, either way - there is at the very least an expert level of bullshitting going on here, to the point that the question can be put aside and the record can be thoroughly enjoyed as purely abstract sound.
it's a pretty ubiquitous background influence, along with the other major nin remix discs (closer & fdts, especially). but, it really comes out very strongly on the current featured track.
(relevant tracks: why is the current featured track with the obvious influence, but fixed is a formative influence and can be heard in everything i've ever done)
Nacht Schreck
NIN's best release, without a doubt.
Wes Murray
+Nacht Schreck Not the best, IMO, but definitely overlooked and underrated. Broken & Fixed are both gems that rarely get the attention they deserve.
deathtokoalas
+Nacht Schreck i think it's without a doubt in the top tier, along with the full-length closer single and further down the spiral - and maybe the perfect drug single. motp would make the top tier, too, if it was a bit longer. also, quake. but, i think it's hard to be more specific than that.
the best material was without a doubt the remix compilations between halo 6 and 11. 5 & 8 were the best proper records, so you could maybe claim the classic period was 5-11, but they're not on the same level.
Jacob French
+Nacht Schreck The Fragile is the best, easily. Broken and Fixed were basically prototypes for TDS, and TDS served as the prelude to The Fragile.
deathtokoalas
+Jacob French for brevity, i'll let the statement stand. but, intent and outcome are not the same thing; the reality is that the fragile was an artistic failure, due largely to the lyrics and the lack of development around the album's release. a strong remix suite would have helped a lot. but, what the listener actually got was a string of half developed songs with vocals that were dragged down so far by alcoholism that they are borderline autistic. the drugs actually seemed to help him in his composition, but they had the effect of really legitimately ruining the songs through the lyrics.
i can't imagine how any halfways intelligent person could listen to the record and not deduce that he's gone full retard. because he actually did - he drank himself stupid, and the record is the consequence of it.
and that's the actual truth of it.
like i say - he could have saved the period with a strong remix set. but, what we got seemed haphazardly thrown together in a drunken haze.
Jacob French
That's what's so good about it, it's literally the morning after Trent's success of TDS. He spent all that time with destructive songs that when he tries to rebuild some semblance of his sound back up again, all he gets is this fragile haze of mixed messages.
The Wretched completely embodies his feelings about the album as a whole, it's not supposed to feel like this complete destruction in vein of Broken or TDS. It's the aftermath of the complete destruction, where Trent is just trying anything to glue his music together. That's what makes it such a perfect concept album along with TDS, it isn't supposed to sound super-polished or like some stereotypical finale to what Trent's career has been so far. He destroys his own music with TDS and The Fragile is Trent seeing if anything is left to begin again from, and in my opinion there is.
But I'm curious, what would you name NIN's best album?
deathtokoalas
+Jacob French that's the kind of rationalization people throw around at velvet underground records - this idea that it's lacklustre on purpose, and therefore brilliant. it's reaching, to say the least.
i think you've got the process drastically wrong, as well. see, here's the thing: there's an original version of the fragile that was never released and was never leaked (to my knowledge). the record label wouldn't allow it. i suspect that it's probably brilliant - and features a lot of writing that is similar to the still ep. but, he caved.
polished or not polished is a sort of ridiculous way to describe his work - it's all polished. even the nastiest, most grating parts of it. but, the record was definitely altered for mass appeal by people that weren't trent reznor. and, that is a big part of the reason it doesn't hold up.
don't get me wrong: there's enough material, there. a fully instrumental single record would have been an incredible kick to the head. and, a couple of the ballads are worth saving. but, pretty much all of the traditional "rock songs" seem written down to a caricature of his audience, under extreme pressure to produce a marketable product. you have to understand that what we got is not what was intended, and we may never hear the intended record.
in the end, the label executives won - they wanted with teeth. whatever. i'd just like to hear the actual record.
Donkey Kong
+deathtokoalas Where did you hear that?
deathtokoalas
+Donkey Kong well, i lived through the process. it was well understood. i don't remember sources from 20 years ago, but they were mainstream - look at stuff like rolling stone or spin.
he had a completely different record prepared that was more "serious", but the label rejected it and sent him back to make more hard-hitting rock songs and radio-friendly singles.
ironically, that's the reason people reacted so badly to it. it's a lot of recycled ideas (and he's still recycling those ideas). and, it's a lot of pandering to an imagined demographic. over time, what's happened is that his initial fan base has moved out and a new fan base that reflects that imagined demographic has moved in.
remember: nin fans in the 90s weren't much into rock or metal. they were mostly into techno and "industrial"; where it interfaced with rock was more in various types of post-punk. you'd have been more likely to find a nin fan into public enemy than into tool. so, it's a huge turnover in his fan base. the fragile is a kind of a pivot point, in that respect.
i pointed out elsewhere that i consider the still ep to be his last substantial release under the nin moniker. and, rumours have long been floating around that this material was initially meant for the fragile. it certainly fits the description of the rejected material, anyways, and is a good feel for what the record was intended to sound like.
==
Aydin Matney
screaming slave sounds like a death grips song
deathtokoalas
+Aydin Matney not really. but you should check out the ice cube remix of i'm afraid of americans. it's everything death grips wish they could have been
obligatory influential...
this is a kind of a lost classic. i was listening to it a lot in early '98, because i was on a big puppy kick and the genesis influence in puppy has always been overwhelming to me, because i grew up with so much genesis. something reminded me of this, so i reached for it and it stuck in the changer for quite a bit. i remember specifically thinking i wanted to emulate that 80s synth drum hit. it comes in after the bridge. the guitars, as well; the track i'm citing is pretty distant, but i was consciously pulling from this.
i was very, very young when i first connected with this. my dad was a huge genesis/gabriel fan. i was probably exposed to it in the womb - not this, it was released when i was five, but pretty much the whole swath of it from trespass forwards. this was always a favourite of mine, for as long as i can remember.
why don't you just listen to los endos? was the question that was constantly posed, and i never really had a good answer other than that i just liked this better. i'm not sure i can still uphold that argument.
is this the absolute end of genesis as a relevant musical force? probably. and, you probably need a broader perspective to put it in context as relevant at all. but, relevant it is - and very forward thinking when you project it forwards a few years.
(relevant tracks: why)
this is a kind of a lost classic. i was listening to it a lot in early '98, because i was on a big puppy kick and the genesis influence in puppy has always been overwhelming to me, because i grew up with so much genesis. something reminded me of this, so i reached for it and it stuck in the changer for quite a bit. i remember specifically thinking i wanted to emulate that 80s synth drum hit. it comes in after the bridge. the guitars, as well; the track i'm citing is pretty distant, but i was consciously pulling from this.
i was very, very young when i first connected with this. my dad was a huge genesis/gabriel fan. i was probably exposed to it in the womb - not this, it was released when i was five, but pretty much the whole swath of it from trespass forwards. this was always a favourite of mine, for as long as i can remember.
why don't you just listen to los endos? was the question that was constantly posed, and i never really had a good answer other than that i just liked this better. i'm not sure i can still uphold that argument.
is this the absolute end of genesis as a relevant musical force? probably. and, you probably need a broader perspective to put it in context as relevant at all. but, relevant it is - and very forward thinking when you project it forwards a few years.
(relevant tracks: why)
obligatory influential...
i picked up a cassette of fixed some time around '94 or so. at first, i couldn't listen to it. it was just noise. but, i kept coming back to it out of a sense of curiosity: is there something to this under the chaos? is this something abstract i ought to understand? or is it really just a lot of noise?
it finally clicked some time in mid '95 or so, and it got stuck in my walkman after that for months and months at a time. i actually managed to literally wear the tape out, and had to repurchase on cd.
i'm not sure i've ever really got an answer to that question, so much as it acted as a means of familiarizing myself with the concept of noise as music. about half the disc is carefully sculpted and arranged. the thirlwell mixes, especially, are definitely works of art. but, there's also a good helping of total noise on the disc that exists on a kind of boundary point. if you listen to it repeatedly, patterns start to arise and you become familiar with them, meaning it does function as artistically valid from start to finish. but, it's an open question as to whether those patterns were composed or just haphazardly spliced together. the thing is that it's not obvious, either way - there is at the very least an expert level of bullshitting going on here, to the point that the question can be put aside and the record can be thoroughly enjoyed as purely abstract sound.
it's a pretty ubiquitous background influence, along with the other major nin remix discs (closer & fdts, especially). but, it really comes out very strongly on the current featured track.
(relevant tracks: why is the current featured track with the obvious influence, but fixed is a formative influence and can be heard in everything i've ever done)
i picked up a cassette of fixed some time around '94 or so. at first, i couldn't listen to it. it was just noise. but, i kept coming back to it out of a sense of curiosity: is there something to this under the chaos? is this something abstract i ought to understand? or is it really just a lot of noise?
it finally clicked some time in mid '95 or so, and it got stuck in my walkman after that for months and months at a time. i actually managed to literally wear the tape out, and had to repurchase on cd.
i'm not sure i've ever really got an answer to that question, so much as it acted as a means of familiarizing myself with the concept of noise as music. about half the disc is carefully sculpted and arranged. the thirlwell mixes, especially, are definitely works of art. but, there's also a good helping of total noise on the disc that exists on a kind of boundary point. if you listen to it repeatedly, patterns start to arise and you become familiar with them, meaning it does function as artistically valid from start to finish. but, it's an open question as to whether those patterns were composed or just haphazardly spliced together. the thing is that it's not obvious, either way - there is at the very least an expert level of bullshitting going on here, to the point that the question can be put aside and the record can be thoroughly enjoyed as purely abstract sound.
it's a pretty ubiquitous background influence, along with the other major nin remix discs (closer & fdts, especially). but, it really comes out very strongly on the current featured track.
(relevant tracks: why is the current featured track with the obvious influence, but fixed is a formative influence and can be heard in everything i've ever done)
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