...too good to be true i'm afraid

Ummm...you heard Saul's latest song to appear on his new record right? it seems so apparent he's not going along Reznor's lines anymore, so what i just said above belongs in safe-to-assume category, don't get me wrong i myself dream of more songs like Banged and blown through, Raised to be lowered, Convict colony...

scott_pawsey posted:

LobotomyBaby posted:

^ wow, that is odd.

i think Niggy Tardust is better than Year Zero, Ghosts, and The Slip

Disagreed about Year Zero, but agreed about Ghosts and The Slip. Niggy Tardust is great, I hope that Trent and Saul eventually do another collaboration.

I'm generally not into rap/hip-hop, but I really liked that album (not as much as any NIN though).

culture_failure posted:

Here's two that are in the same ballpark:

1) I don't understand all the hoopla surrounding The Social Network soundtrack. It's good and certainly helped shape the feel of the film but to regard it as some compositional masterpiece that is beyond anything most mortals have created or heard seems a bit...much. And my phrasing it that way isn't hyperbole; some people seriously appear to be regarding it that way.

I mean, there are songs Clint Mansell wrote ten years ago that blow this out of the water. Even some stuff by Cliff Martinez. Again, I'm not saying Trent's work on TSN was bland, I'm saying the idea that it's soooo groundbreaking and innovative is, IMO, far fetched.



2) I also don't understand all the hoopla surrounding Ghosts. Probably even less so. I have to wonder if anyone who talks about how great it is says so because of where it fits in the trajectory of TR's musical output or because of the music itself. It's the difference between "wow, this is great music from NIN" vs. "wow, this is great music." With regards to the former, yes, it was fantastic to see NIN delve into this style of music and I'd love to hear more of it. But the latter? Not so much. I found it mostly boring and emotionally tedious. COIL did this in the 80's and did it better. And Aphex Twin set the bar in 1994 with SAW V2 and nobody has come close to reaching that benchmark.

There's a cult of personality around TR which is to be expected given the fact he's a pop icon / rock star. But I think it influences (heavily at times) otherwise objective analyses of his creations - especially in terms of being innovatively relevant.

This can all be shortened down to: "Instrumentals aren't my thing."

culture_failure posted:

Here's two that are in the same ballpark:

1) I don't understand all the hoopla surrounding The Social Network soundtrack. It's good and certainly helped shape the feel of the film but to regard it as some compositional masterpiece that is beyond anything most mortals have created or heard seems a bit...much. And my phrasing it that way isn't hyperbole; some people seriously appear to be regarding it that way.

I mean, there are songs Clint Mansell wrote ten years ago that blow this out of the water. Even some stuff by Cliff Martinez. Again, I'm not saying Trent's work on TSN was bland, I'm saying the idea that it's soooo groundbreaking and innovative is, IMO, far fetched.

I think, considering this was Trent's first real attempt at actually scoring a film (I don't count the small amount of score work he did on Lost Highway), the praise is well deserved, and the fact that he managed to, through his and Atticus' music, help make a film about Facebook interesting and compelling is what really makes the score so impressive. Yeah, there are better soundtracks out there, but for a first timer, Trent really knocked it out of the park.

Also, I can listen to the score separated from the film and enjoy it on its own for different reasons. Most film scores I can't do that with, so I'm glad to say that it works as both a score and as an album of pretty good instrumental music.

posted:

2) I also don't understand all the hoopla surrounding Ghosts. Probably even less so. I have to wonder if anyone who talks about how great it is says so because of where it fits in the trajectory of TR's musical output or because of the music itself. It's the difference between "wow, this is great music from NIN" vs. "wow, this is great music." With regards to the former, yes, it was fantastic to see NIN delve into this style of music and I'd love to hear more of it. But the latter? Not so much. I found it mostly boring and emotionally tedious. COIL did this in the 80's and did it better. And Aphex Twin set the bar in 1994 with SAW V2 and nobody has come close to reaching that benchmark.

I think Ghosts is great because it's great, nothing more than that. I love SAW Volume II, and it's definitely a superior album in my opinion, but that doesn't make me dismiss Ghosts. They're really two different kinds of albums anyway. Ghosts is rock-oriented, while SAW Volume II is more ambient-oriented. It's kind of like the difference between Pink Floyd instrumentals and Brian Eno instrumentals for the most part. Both great, but in different ways.

I don't think it's fair to criticize Ghosts just because it's not "the best". I like it for what it is, and I think that's fair. Besides, the album is only three years old (SAW Volume II is getting closer to its 20th anniversary). Who knows what people will think of it in the years to come?

posted:

There's a cult of personality around TR which is to be expected given the fact he's a pop icon / rock star. But I think it influences (heavily at times) otherwise objective analyses of his creations - especially in terms of being innovatively relevant.

If you're a NIN fan, you can't be objective most of the time. Even some of the negative reviews from fans on some of the albums are most of the time attributed to the fact that it doesn't sound like *insert NIN album here*.

And I personally could care less if music is innovative as long as I dig it. If I connect to the music, that's all I need, and I connect to The Social Network and Ghosts.

culture_failure posted:

2) I also don't understand all the hoopla surrounding Ghosts. Probably even less so. I have to wonder if anyone who talks about how great it is says so because of where it fits in the trajectory of TR's musical output or because of the music itself. It's the difference between "wow, this is great music from NIN" vs. "wow, this is great music." With regards to the former, yes, it was fantastic to see NIN delve into this style of music and I'd love to hear more of it. But the latter? Not so much. I found it mostly boring and emotionally tedious. COIL did this in the 80's and did it better. And Aphex Twin set the bar in 1994 with SAW V2 and nobody has come close to reaching that benchmark.

This. What I'm even more tired of is cruddy teenager Not Really Industrial Quiet Ambient Instrumental Music Project With Uncreative Name bands. Fuck that shit. They don't realize (and sometimes I think Trent's forgotten it too) that NIN is very much 'rage fueled.' There is anger there, and that's the core. Yes, there are quiet moody songs, but...well, look at Pretty Hate Machine, for example. There's 'one' quiet moody song on it. Out of ten. That means that only 10% of NIN is That.

I dislike Corona Radiata.

With Teeth and The Slip didn't seem that great, but only because I'm forced to compare them to TDS and The Fragile, which were masterpieces.

I think the baseline in the chorus of "Closer" is AMAZING and sexy as hell.

BenAkenobi posted:

OnslaughtSix, i thought a considerably big part of Ghosts was heavy and you feel no rage in it purely because of absense of words.
yes, this was my today's controversial opinion

That might be part of it, but it could also be I don't exactly think what Trent thinks is heavy now is what I think is heavy. It's a strange line. Really, the problem is, I'm just an asshole music snob.

...and NIN has not played w decent band in a live non-festival setting since Fragility. Jane's Addiction does not count, they sucked BAD on NINJA, like really bad. it was painful, and I love Jane's, I've seen them tons of times since the first lollapalooza through NINJA, and now, theyre just bored and phoning it in and pieces of my childhood broke off and started rotting when I saw them in Noblesville, IN and Burgettstown, PA in the summer of 2009.
and they shouldve opened for NIN, not the other way around.

and Queens of the Stone Age from WT tour, just...kill them with fire already.

BenAkenobi posted:

OnslaughtSix, i thought a considerably big part of Ghosts was heavy and you feel no rage in it purely because of absense of words.
yes, this was my today's controversial opinion

exactly
of course loud doesn't equal "heavy", that's like saying the bigger the better
Ghosts is heavy in that its very emotionally charged, exactly the same with most NIN's work, only this time the means of expression were different

i wouldn't say nin is rage fueled, there is disappointment, disgust, bitterness, despair but not rage as a fuel

OnslaughtSix posted:

That might be part of it, but it could also be I don't exactly think what Trent thinks is heavy now is what I think is heavy.

31 Ghosts fucking IV

DRanged691 posted:

Not sure if this is really controversial, as I have no idea how many people feel the same way, but...

I actually like seeing Trent's music evolve and change over time. I also like seeing him branch out and do other non-nin related things.

It's not controversial, actually. It is.

The-Evasionist_
i'm really interested in how do you rate Starfuckers Inc