Even Deeper # 5, What's Taking So Long Trent?
Oct 11 '02
The Bottom Line This column explains the reasons of the long length between NIN albums and the numerous activity and bleak mind of Trent Reznor.
Even Deeper # 5-Why is Trent Reznor Taking So Long to Make NIN Albums?
As of October of 2002, there has been no major news on Nine Inch Nails or the highly anticipated Tapeworm side-project with Tool’s Maynard James Keenan. In late summer, a rumor surfaced over the Tapeworm side project when the Los Angeles-based modern rock station K-Rock announced that the Tapeworm project was scheduled for release in December of 2002 but that was quickly disintegrated when the NIN news site, the NIN Hotline revealed that Reznor and Keenan have pushed the project to 2003 which could only spell more trouble as some fans are now waiting with impatience. A few weeks later, MTV News released an article on possible new albums from several stars ranging from pop acts ‘Nsync, Backstreet Boys, and Destiny’s Child to the Beastie Boys, NIN, and the long-awaited album “Chinese Democracy” album from Guns N’ Roses that hasn’t been confirmed for a release date.
With news circulating whether a new NIN album will ever come out in 2003, MTV News have mentioned about the history of NIN that has been known as a sore bruise to the recording industry since Reznor is notorious for spending a lot of time on his own records. It took Reznor five years to make a full-length follow-up to his debut “Pretty Hate Machine” with 1994’s “The Downward Spiral” and another five years to follow that up for 1999’s “The Fragile”. While he did release records in between these years, some wondered what’s behind Trent Reznor’s mind when he’s making albums and what goes on during those years under the music mainstream radar. Well, as a longtime NIN fan and an unofficial historian, I’ve come up with four big reasons to explain the reason behind the long length between albums:
1. His Notorious Perfectionism
2. Roles in Numerous Projects In/Out of NIN
3. His Bleak State of Mind and Isolation
4. Obsession with Video Games
I. Trent Reznor, the Perfectionist.
If there’s one thing the recording industry hates more than anything, it’s perfectionists. Perfectionists are the ones that drive the music execs crazy with delaying schedules and spending massive amounts of advances on stuff that might produce a hit or a miss. The execs aren’t the only ones angry with those people, sometimes fans are too waiting for their favorite artist or band to release the album and the waiting can be very frustrating. Trent Reznor and NIN are no exception since they too are a difficult act for the record companies, the music press, and their fans as well.
While Reznor does produce great music in his already 13-year career, his notorious role as a perfectionist is enough to put him in the league of other noteworthy perfectionists like the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson, My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Shields, Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins, Ministry’s Al Jourgensen, Fleetwood Mac’s Lindsey Buckingham, Def Leppard, AC/DC, and Shania Twain producer Mutt Lange, and to lesser extents, Michael Jackson, Guns N’ Roses singer Axl Rose, and Boston’s Tom Scholz. Some of these artists who played the perfectionist role have been widely criticized the press, the industry, and music fans but they should understand the fact that these artists are driven to make records that are great in their own minds whether fans liked them or not. Some of these perfectionists did produce great music while others ended up paying the price for their own perfectionism.
While Trent Reznor is nowhere in the league of the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson, the two do have similar characteristics. Both have suffered mental depression and the inspiration comes to them very slowly. Brian Wilson is famous as the mastermind for the Beach Boys who wrote many of the band’s upbeat hits about surfing and the bright, sunny atmosphere of California. Despite all that success during the early 60s, Brian Wilson was troubled by his own fragile mind stemming from nonstop touring and the physical, mental, and verbal abuse from his father Murray. After quitting the touring cycle of the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson stayed home and concentrated to write songs for the band including their 1966 masterpiece “Pet Sounds” which took nearly a year to create and produce. He followed that up with six months of production for the song “Good Vibrations” that propelled him as rock’s most notorious perfectionist. While “Pet Sounds” wasn’t a commercial success in the U.S. in 1966, it was a widely praised album in Britain and with the music press that led him to make his notorious work, “Smile”. With lyricist Van Dyke Parks, “Smile” was an album that was supposed to exceed all the musical boundaries that “Pet Sounds” had produced but unfortunately, Wilson’s state of mind and increasing drug use took a toll on him as he shelved “Smile” and became a recluse staying in his bed for a few years.
Today, Brian Wilson survived his mental depression and is currently and slowly making a new album. While he has written songs in the past few years, he has no intentions of pushing himself to making an album as quickly as possible since he’s someone who doesn’t like to be pushed. Reznor is also that person to some extent although unlike Wilson, tends to push himself a bit more aggressively. Other artists like Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush have also taken a lot of time away from making albums. Gabriel’s new album “Up” is his first in 10 years where already, several critics have given the album lukewarm reviews have said that “Up” sounded like he made this album for ten years. Actually, it’s a lot less than that since after the release of “Us”, he’d lost interest in making music for himself and focus on multimedia projects and his label Real World Records. Bush meanwhile has been keeping a low profile since 1993’s “The Red Shoes and is concentrating on living quietly in England until last year where she announced that she’s in preparations for a new album that as of now has not been scheduled for release.
Other notorious perfectionists in the alternative rock circle like Billy Corgan, Al Jourgensen, and Kevin Shields have been keeping a low profile over the years. With the recent breakup of the Smashing Pumpkins in late 2000, Corgan has formed a new band Zwan with his former Pumpkins drummer Jimmy Chamberlain and is currently making a new album for his new band. Corgan, a fan of 70s progressive rock, has been notorious for his perfectionism that has been a troubling sore for his old band including 1993’s “Siamese Dreams” where he ended up playing most of the instruments on the album and his desire to make great albums like Reznor can be tedious at times but there’s no denying that Corgan is a talented individual as he is currently making plans to release Zwan. Ministry’s Al Jourgensen is also notorious for his perfectionism that spawned great Ministry albums like “The Land of Rape & Honey” and “Psalm 69” that broke the rules for industrial music but recent ventures like 1996’s “Filth Pig” and 1999’s “Dark Side of the Spoon” have been unspectacular. His tendency to find the right beats and guitar riffs have frustrated some fans but with his recent renewed confidence after the song “What About Us” for the Steven Spielberg film “A.I.” in which the band appeared in, it’s obvious Jourgensen and company are finally getting themselves back on track.
If Reznor, Corgan, and Jourgensen are the cornerstones of perfectionism in alt-rock, then none of them are as notorious as My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Shields. 1988’s “Isn’t Anything” was a landmark release for the shoegazing rock band as MBV released EPs between 1988 and 1991 as Shields worked on the band’s next album “Loveless”. Shields’ tendency to experiment with samplers, drum machines, and other gadgets made him notorious as he desperately tried to break ground musically that nearly bankrupted Creation Records for almost $500,000. While “Loveless” is one of the 1990s’ greatest albums, MBV never followed it up as Shields went into hiding and has so far made two albums worth of material that he has not released so far. Currently, Shields is now making his very first solo album where it is pretty obvious there hasn’t been any release dates scheduled and don’t expect it to come out in 2003.
Reznor is not alone when it comes to exploring new musical territories and instruments since he spent two years doing that during the sessions for “The Fragile” which was one of the reasons for its commercial failure in late 1999 at the age of glossy teen-pop and raucous rap-metal music. Whenever an artist tries to do something new and move forward musically, it’s a bitter sore for the industry and no one is doing that more aggravating and lengthwise as Guns N’ Roses singer Axl Rose. After firing several of the original GNR lineup including guitar hero Slash, Rose retooled his band to explore new sounds for six years now and the recent surprise appearance at the 2002 MTV Video Music Awards showcased the band has so far revealed one song, “Madagascar” during their performance. For fans that are waiting for the new GNR album, “Chinese Democracy”, the wait is getting smaller as Axl and his new boys might finally come out soon, possibly in 2004.
While Trent Reznor’s role as a perfectionist at times is frustrating, he’ll admit he doesn’t want to go overboard into his work and is not thinking about making the great album that the public will love. That’s been the problem pop superstar Michael Jackson has been having. After the colossal success of “Thriller”, he has desperately tried and tried to top the worldwide sales of “Thriller” but has begun to lose himself in his work. His most recent album, “Invincible” took nearly five years and $30 million dollars to make has now disappeared from the charts as he blames his label for the poor sales.
Another artist whose perfectionism has been criticized is Boston’s Tom Scholz. Boston’s 1976 self-titled debut for a while was the best-selling debut album ever made for its bombastic production and wailing power guitar solos that was loved by mainstream rock fans but hated by critics and punk rockers as it began the era of what its called, “Corporate Rock”. Scholz took two years to make the band’s follow-up album “Don’t Look Back” released in 1978 to good sales but didn’t match the sales of its debut and Scholz claimed the album was rushed. He then went back into the studio to make the follow-up to “Don’t Look Back” which took eight years and the resulting album “Third Stage” sounded exactly like all the records Boston made. Scholz took another eight years to make the band’s 1994 album “Walk On” that didn’t do well on the charts and critics complained it sounded like all the stuff Boston has done again and now in 2002, he’s releasing a new album titled “Corporate America” which critics have said, sounds like Boston. If you’re going to be a perfectionist, don’t spend eight years making the same old bullsh*t. It’s stupid, at least Michael Jackson at best tries to do something different.
II. Trent Reznor, the Workaholic doing Side-Projects, Remixes, and Other Ideas.
Another reason for the length between NIN albums is Reznor’s tendency to work on other projects. In 1990 while taking a break from NIN, he briefly joined the Revolting Cocks, one of several side-projects by Ministry. Reznor also participated in another Ministry/Al Jourgensen side project called 1000 Homo DJs where they produced a five-track EP that featured a cover of the Black Sabbath song “Supernaut” that Reznor sang but was remixed due to legal wrangling from TVT. Reznor during tour breaks also spent time working on remixes for other artists including Megadeth. While working on “The Downward Spiral”, Reznor also worked putting together a roster for his Nothing Records label in 1992 including Marilyn Manson whose album he produced in 1993. Reznor also spent time doing soundtracks for “The Crow” and “Natural Born Killers” in 1994 along with making an album for old friend Kevin McMahon for his band Prick in 1995 and doing the NIN remix album “Further Down The Spiral” with several NIN members.
1996 was the year Reznor began working on more projects like Manson’s “Antichrist Superstar” album, the “Lost Highway” soundtrack, and the Tapeworm side project. Reznor’s workaholic tendencies have also took time away from NIN to some extent whether it’s good so he wouldn’t have to think about it or it can be bad if you’re doing all of these projects at the same time which is what he’s doing now. While he’s working on the follow-up to “The Fragile”, he’s also working on the Tapeworm side-project with Tool’s Maynard James Keenan, 12 Rounds’ Atticus Ross, and Reznor’s NIN band mates, Danny Lohner and Jerome Dillon with A Perfect Circle’s Josh Freese. Reznor’s workaholic mind is running like clockwork as he is currently finishing the Tapeworm project and then concentrates on the next NIN album. At the same time, Reznor’s got other projects he wanted to do. One is a long-standing project with Dr. Dre that hasn’t gotten off ground since 1999 along with a much talked about project with any female singer Reznor wanted to work with and a band project where Reznor would work with other musicians.
Along with these endless projects, Reznor has also been working on outside projects like remixes and production work for other artists. Most recently, he’s done a remix for the Neptunes-based project N.E.R.D. for their song “Lapdance” and some mixing for the long-awaited 12 Rounds album that still hasn’t been released. Another project Reznor’s been working on for years on-and-off is a long-awaited solo album for former Pop Will Eat Itself singer Clint Mansell that’s been going on for three years now and so far, nothing’s been released. Finally in the late summer of 2002, there have been rumors of a possible collaboration between Reznor and former Rage Against The Machine singer Zach De La Roca that might actually happen since De La Roca has been spotted in New Orleans for some time. With these endless projects and collaborations, it makes you wonder if Reznor ever takes a vacation and he really needs one.
III. The Dark Mind and Isolation of Trent Reznor
It’s a total cliché when it is described that once you become famous, you become isolated in your own world. For Trent Reznor, isolation is almost an extreme part of his life and whenever trouble comes along, he’ll isolate himself completely. Reznor’s bleak state of mind and isolation is often notorious since many of his lyrics have bleak subtexts and dark overtones that is enough to compare him to the likes of Kurt Cobain, Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters, and the late Ian Curtis of Joy Division. His former NIN guitarist Richard Patrick of Filter even wrote a song about Trent’s isolation called “Captain Bligh” on his 1999 album “Title of Record” that described the horrific nature of Reznor’s isolation.
Reznor, who came from a small-town existence like Mercer, Pennsylvania, escaped through the world of science fiction, comic books, and rock music as a way to cope his alienated state of mind as a child. While lyrics in “Pretty Hate Machine” and “Broken” described the angst and loneliness of his young life, they became very eerie during the making of “The Downward Spiral” as the pressure to make a huge album for Interscope Records nearly destroyed his mind he ended up detaching himself from the world for periods of time. During the tour to promote “The Downward Spiral”, he admitted that once he went onstage, he became a different person of rage and deceit that nearly destroyed him. With the addition of the usual dose of rock n’ roll indulgence like drugs, booze, and groupies, his mental state of mind got wrecked and as the tour went on, the character he kept playing onstage nearly took over his life.
In a recent interview with Much Music to promote the NIN live album and DVD “And All That Could Have Been”, Reznor described that when the tour was finished, he thought he would return to his real self, only problem was his real self had been corrupted and lost in his state of mind. Reznor also admitted it got worse during the making of Marilyn Manson’s “Antichrist Superstar” album where he, the band, and their entourage had partied throughout the sessions. Once the party had left, Reznor was the only one doing the partying and he suddenly got lost in the world that he was in and eventually, his friendships with Manson and other people got dissolved.
When the grandmother who raised him as a child died in early 1997, he immediately isolated himself from peers and the world. Recovering from the death of his grandmother and the years before, he went back into the studio to work on “The Fragile”. Reznor examined himself relentlessly on what happened to him in the past few years and wondered if he was fragile himself which is why he called the album “The Fragile”. Though Reznor is now feeling better than he has in years, it remains unclear whether he conquered his bleak state of mind.
IV. Doom, Quake, & Omicron, Trent Reznor & The Video Games
If there’s one thing that artists do need to stop doing, which is screwing around. For Trent Reznor, he’s known for screwing around a lot with video games. Sure, he’s made cool music for Quake and sound for the highly anticipated Doom 3 game, but he really needs to get away from them awhile. The MTV VJs told him that and so have journalists. Sadly, Reznor came from the generation where Pac Man ruled the world and ever since then, he’s been obsessed with video games. He’s even suggested that the best Christmas presents kids should get was the X-Box from Microsoft. There have been rumors that Reznor would play video games for days whenever he’s not doing anything. Not even his band mates or several of his personnel could help since they too, are addicted to playing video games.
Reznor is not the only artist to screw around when it comes to the inactivity period between albums; a lot of artists do that as well. Most notably, the Stone Roses. After gaining success for their 1989 landmark debut and fighting lawsuits against their own label, the Roses signed a deal with Geffen Records in early 1992. The deal gave them a lot of money and the Roses were ready to make their sophomore effort. Unfortunately, they got lost as guitarist John Squire got addicted to cocaine while he and the band spent many of their free time to watch football games. After two years, Geffen got angry as they asked the band where’s the album and it turned out the band did little and screwed around too much by watching silly football games (they must’ve been pulling for Manchester United). Finally in December of 1994, the band released “Second Coming” to mixed reviews and lukewarm album sales that within a couple of years, the band broke up.
I guess when it comes to screwing around with stupid things, you lose insight on what’s important and it is suggested that Trent Reznor should go to a video games addiction program or get someone to play video games for him (Me, me!).
With the new NIN album having the chance to possibly come out in 2003 or 2004 (please, next year so he can break the five-year spell), fans will be waiting patiently for the new album unless Trent Reznor returns to his old habits. All I can suggest is that once he finishes Tapeworm, he should go on vacation and get laid. After that, he can continue working on the NIN album, release it, and tour so I can go see them. Come on man! Stop f*cking around!
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