- photo by SomewhatDamaged2
It was in the middle of the evening when Trent Reznor put Ghosts on the internet. Ghosts Volumes I-IV was a previously unheard of set of albums with purely instrumental music; something that Reznor had featured on many albums before to much praise. The buzz hit the net like a hot wire hitting gasoline. Forums and chat rooms buzzed. Twitters and IM’s flew. A new album out? Wait, a four part album? Instrumental only?
The hardcore Nine Inch Nails and Trent Reznor fans went mad. I know because I was one of them. The first volume was free to download, but you could get all four volumes for only five dollars. I had mine downloaded in 10 minutes and by the time I started listening to the first tracks, many fans were already posting early reviews. They could even post the tracks if they wanted to. The entire album was under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike licence. As long as the tracks were attributed to him, and not being sold commercially, they could be used as the customer saw fit.
Welcome to the music business of the 21st century and one of it’s first pioneers – Trent Reznor. His band/project Nine Inch Nails has sold millions of Cds world wide, and millions of downloads now as well. Musician and performer Trent Reznor wasn’t the first to put entire albums up for digital download. He wasn’t even the first to bypass the record companies to do it, but he is still one of the most inovative and progressive musicians on the leading edge of the internet today.
After dropping a huge album of music like Ghosts in mulitple formats for people that wanted actual CD’s or entire books signed by Reznor to go with them — editions with enough bells and wistles could cost up to $300 — how could he top himself? Simple. He gave his next album out for free. On the NIN’s official website Trent wrote:
thank you for your continued and loyal support over the years – this one’s on me
A free album of music entitled The Slip — to be release on CD in retail stores in the future — was available for free to anyone who wanted to download it. It remains as a free download to this day.
Reznor, who was visibly frustrated by the records business once famously said to a large crowd in Australia during one of his shows:
“Last time I was here, I was doing a lot of complaining about the ridiculous prices of CDs down here. And that story got picked up and got carried all around the world and now my record label all around the world hates me, because I yelled at them, I called them out for being greedy fucking assholes. I didn’t get a chance to check, has the price come down at all? I see a no, a no, a no… Has anyone seen the price come down? Okay, well, you know what that means – STEAL IT. Steal away. Steal and steal and steal some more and give it to all your friends and keep on stealin’. Because one way or another these motherfuckers will get it through their head that they’re ripping people off and that that’s not right.”
Reznor eventuntually broke with his record company once his contract was up, and Reznor’s NIN.com became more than just a homepage for fans. In 2007 Reznor put up remix.nin.com – a place where would-be DJ’s and remixers — or just hardcore fans — could download high bit-rate 8 track versions of his songs and alter them to be uploaded back to the site and shared with other fans. The community flourished and new remixes of old and new songs appear daily. The remix site incorporates a ratings system and comments for each remixed track. Trent even uploads his own remixes from time to time.
Though Reznor’s success is being watched by other musicians, few seem willing to join him in the deep end of the internet pool. Not every artist has as rabidly loyal a fan base as Reznor, and not every songwriter and musician is prolific enough to produce so much work in a short amount of time. Free from his record label, flush with the success of previous albums, tours and merchandising, and with the internet as a pipeline directly to fans Reznor has the resources he needs to pull off these ground-breaking experiments.
But what about unknown or less successful artists?
In 2007 Reznor collaborated with poet and author Saul Williams on the music album The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of Niggy Tardust – the title being a take-off on an old David Bowie album. Reznor sent out emails to his legions of fans and even released songs on torrent sites for them to listen to. He offered the whole work on his website and asked that anyone who downloaded consider paying a small price, but it was not required. The album its self used no Digital Rights Management (or DRM), and was thus freely copyable. The album downloads were more than five times the sales of Saul’s 2004 debut album in just three months of digital release. Of the roughly 150,000 downloaders, Reznor reported that over 20,000 have payed the five dollar asking price. Overall, the experiment was not a huge success, but neither was it a failure.
There is a famous saying that one definition of a pioneer is someone with an arrow in his back. So far album and concert ticket sales have not proven to be a problem, and critical and well as fan buzz on his new works seem good. Reznor, who dealt with cocaine and alcohol abuse problems in 2001, seems genuinely happy in his role as musician and internet innovator. NIN.com continues to grow and prosper, and the man himself stays busy composing, performing and keeping in touch with his audience. The question of whether or not his is an innovator who will be followed, one of the lucky few who made a new business model work, or a man who’s luck is about to run out has yet to be decided. But Reznor seems poised to make major mark in the history of popular music, one way or another.
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