Posts Tagged ‘Nine Inch Nails’
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Drew better start listening to Floyd.
Whenever I think of The Wizard of Oz, I hear the Dark Side of the Moon. If you’ve never tried the whole sync thing, do it. I believe that it works. You can do it twice with the Dark Side of the Moon and the Wizard of Oz.
It is my opinion that this also works with the vinyl version of the Fragile and Taxi Driver. Trent Reznor mentioned in his 9-9-99 interview about the Fragile that he had been watching Taxi Driver a lot. I tried syncing both the vinyl and cd versions of the album (which are different) and only the vinyl version works out right. The movie and the album are exactly the same length. You just have to allow the appropriate amount of time to flip the album. This doesn’t have as many similarities as the Pink Floyd stuff, but the mood and the feel matches well.
For more syncing info, go here.
I worked on the documentary on Sunday and Monday, then took time out on Tuesday to watch movies. I finally watched 15 Minutes. I had heard that it was bad, but I enjoyed it. I also watched Platoon Leader, which I only enjoyed because of my interest in the Vietnam war. It is basically a low budget answer to Platoon.
I forgot to mention last week that I went to see The Rules of Attraction. I found the style interesting, but wouldn’t watch it again. Except maybe for the montage, which was a fast and cool account of some dudes trip to Europe. Patti hated this movie.
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This has nothing to do with movies, but I feel bad about not providing you guys with a new comic today. So I thought the least I could do was tell you a story about the Nine Inch Nails concert I went to last night.
Well, actually – The LEAST I could do is nothing. But you get my meaning.
Jared and I went to the concert together last night pulling into the parking lot about 6:00. We we just kind of hanging out for a while, waiting to go in – when I realized about 6:20 that I had forgotten the tickets!
I felt like such a moron. At the end of the day Thursday, the last thing Jared said to me before I went home (we work in the same office building and department) was "DON’T FORGET THE TICKETS!" I went home, let Truman out to go to the bathroom, changed clothes, made sure Truman was fed and immediately had to turn around to get across town and pick up Jared. In my rush, I forgot the tickets.
So we’re rocketing back across town on the Interstate the day after we got this big snow and ice storm, trying to get back to my house so we can grab the tickets and get back to the arena before the show starts at 7:30. We managed to do it, but what a waste of time. Jared was actually really understanding. I figured he’d be really ticked off, considering he’s the Nine Inch Nails Super Fan. But he was cool about it. I think I was actually more upset.
Our tickets were for general admission, so once we got inside, we headed to the floor. We positioned ourselves center stage half way between the front row and the sound board. It was a pretty good spot. We stood behind this guy and his girlfriend who was a total Avril Lavigne clone. Except she was about 4 feet tall, so it made it really easy to see over her.
The opening band was called Moving Units and the were nothing spectacular. They were out-and-out rip offs of The Killers. And I hate The Killers. Their lead singer was mumbling the whole time and acted barely enthused to be there. I’m sorry, but that’s just posing. If I was in a band lucky enough to open up for Nine Inch Nails and play big arenas, I think I could muster a little more enthusiasm. They left the stage with a smattering of applause.
When Nine Inch Nails started an hour later, Jared and I were shoved toward opposite ends of the crowd, so I didn’t see him until the end of the show.
The show itself was really good. A good mix of new and old songs, frenetic mosh pit anthems and slower, more atmospheric work. Most importantly, they played "Suck" – which is probably my favorite Nine Inch Nails song ever. I remember playing that one over and over when I was in high school. Just taking long walks, stomping around and listening to it on an infinite loop.
Trent Reznor looked really good. I don’t know what he’s been doing lately, but I’d like to look into whatever health program he’s got going on. I’m used to pasty-faced, scrawny Trent Renznor. I don’t remember the man having big muscle-y arms. The crew cut he was sporting made him look like a miniature Henry Rollins! Without the tattoos, of course! ;-D
Something about concert audiences: If you are a crowd-surfer, DIE! Just do us all a favor and die. By the middle of the set, the sway and the crush of the audience squeezed me to about the third row. Really not a lot of room to manuever up there. You couldn’t really leave if you wanted to. As such, you don’t have the ability to turn around and keep your eyes peeled for incoming morons. I took a lot of kicks to the back of the head.
My antigonistic relationship with crowd-surfers leads me to extreme pettiness. If you come anywhere near me, I *WILL* try to steal your shoe. If I can’t get your shoe, I will punch you in the spine.
There were some people giving me some harsh looks when I was taking pocket shots to Johnny Crowd-Surfer’s kidneys. "Hey, man! It’s all part of the concert experience! Let ’em surf, man!"
"HEY, MAN! If they surf, they gotta expect not everyone is going to enjoy having to prop up their dumb asses with the back of their necks when they come out of nowhere!"
Some people were really turned off by my attitude, but you know there are people around you that feel the same way. I saw a few people start grabbing for shoes later in the show and it made me feel like I had accomplished something.
I’m actually leaving out a few important details about the crowd-surfers that had me so cheesed off. Earlier in the show when I was further away from the stage and there were still openings in the pit, a crowd-surfer came near me and suddenly there was no support under him. The dude crashed into me, pushing me backwards. His entire body weight was pressed against my throat as he decended with his forearm across my Adam’s Apple. The crowd response was pretty fast and they helped us back on our feet. But when I got up, I wanted to cave that guy’s head in. He sunk back into the crowd.
Another future brain surgeon tried to prop himself up into crowd-surfing position not by gathering the people around him to hoist him up on their hands. Rather, he put his hands on my shoulders and tried to climb up my back! When that wasn’t working, he actually put his hands AROUND MY THROAT! Okay, party foul, buddy. I promptly spun around, threw his arms off me and politely suggested he not do that. Ah, who am I kidding. I swore up a storm and tried to scare the living crap out of him. "It’s a concert," right?
I don’t want to make it sound like I had a bad time. I also don’t know why I seemed to be exposed to repeated throat injury. The concet was awesome and I had a good vantage point throughout. Those were just the little annoying things that I’m telling you about just to spice up the story a bit. Otherwise, it would be a pretty short story! "I went to a concert. I had a good time. FIN!"
Anyway, there you have it. Story time is over.
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I was kind of spacing off for a moment and quietly reflecting on Trent Reznor’s win last Sunday at the Golden Globes for Best Original Score.
After watching the ceremony last week, Reznor’s win along with the several additional trophies The Social Network took home that night, I was motivated to listen to the film’s soundtrack and slipped into it’s dithering electronic hum for an hour or so.
Reznor’s score is probably one of my favorites of the year. But another electronic act – Daft Punk – also ranks highly for their work on the Tron: Legacy soundtrack.
I am certain I am not the first to notice that these two genre powerhouses dipped a toe in Tinsletown this year. But I am struck by the disparity of their output.
While the Tron: Legacy soundtrack is enthralling and certainly grandiose in scope, it was criticized for not bringing enough of Daft Punk’s signature drive to the table. Some people found it a little heavy on the orchestration and a little light on the booty-shakin’ beats.
I appreciate the Tron: Legacy soundtrack for what it is, but admit I wish that the signature track “Derezzed” was about 15 minutes longer…
By comparison, Reznor’s work is very similar to much of Nine Inch Nails’ instrumental catalog. The atmosphere of the score fits in quiet comfortably with the dark, melodic underpinnings of NIN remix EPs like Still or Ghosts I–IV. In many cases, tracks retain the propulsive beat missing from Daft Punk’s soundtrack work – even if it veers into distorted, bleak territory.
I’m not arguing that either effort is better than the other. But it’s interesting to notice the trajectory of these artist’s work. Reznor stuck with a formula that’s been evolving for over 20 years and converged with director David Fincher’s vision for The Social Network.
Daft Punk, on the other hand, completely re-imagined their sound. A successful effort that fans were not expecting and was met with varying degrees of acceptance.
Just making observations. How about you? Do you own either soundtrack? Do you believe Reznor was deserving of his Golden Globe victory? Leave your comments below.
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