So @Ryan , I searched myself, looks like you removed this cover without explanations : http://www.nin.wiki/File:Ntae_alt_3.jpg what happened ?
So @Ryan , I searched myself, looks like you removed this cover without explanations : http://www.nin.wiki/File:Ntae_alt_3.jpg what happened ?
I could see branches/bones being the same but the final track, BB being dive/slam. Bands like to do that, reoccurring or similar titles balancing out the album.
^^^^I meant branches/bones still opener but the final track would be dive/slam, really BB just renamed. Worded weird, sorry. You must have not been around a few months ago during the dive/slam news. It was registered as a nin song a few months ago. Not sure if a hoax or tr changed the plan.
Edit-didnt quote properly.
@kraw I actually really would love if you could maybe comment just a little bit on the process behind NTAE's artwork, what conversations took place about going back to Still-era art, what the meaning behind it was, etc. I personally like all of it (and think the air of mystery and confusion around the art for a NIN release is really wonderful to have back again) but it'd be great to hear a bit about it from the person who actually made it. Was there a motive behind having so many different covers, did Trent specifically request so many different variants, did you come to him with them and pitch it?
Sometimes I'm not sure if I liked it better when there was more mystique or when there was more open conversation about how the sausage is made.
At the moment, I'm loving the mystique. It's really engaging and has me coming back to the music for the pleasure of the songs as well as the possibility of noticing something new in the lyrics. This has already been a fun era.
Hard not to think that the forthcoming major releases in 2017 will relate, directly or not, to Not The Actual Events. Maybe that's the HTDA fan in me talking (i.e. An omen EP), but with some pretty big questions still lingering (Why re-use the Still artwork? What's the nature of the physical component? Will there be more than one live show?), it feels like a bigger story/larger context for this EP will be unfolding over the year... and that's exciting to think about!
I can't help but think Twin Peaks is related to all this, an episode using the songs from the EP or something
From a New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/12/a...tnam.html?_r=0) article:
“The tone of concern in ‘Before the Flood’ led perfectly into the pure dread, evil and melancholy that we explored in ‘Patriots Day,’ which also provided us the momentum to make the Nine Inch Nails record ugly and confrontational,” Mr. Reznor explained. “We could go deeper in each pool knowing it wasn’t forever. We could take a break from the end of the world by going into a terrorist bombing, or take a break from that by making an ‘I want to kill myself’ album.”
I think that Nine Inch Nails recently started to do this a lot, the clearest album was probably ironically The Downward Spiral where it is much easier to know what is happening in the story.
The Fragile gave us that sense of mystery and for us to find our own meaning and this was something we saw as with more and more releases, The Slip can be intepreted in many ways what it says as an entire album, same for Hesitation Marks. And I really love this.
I loved this little moment in an interview when Trent was asked about the meaning of lyrics behind Came Back Haunted and he didn't tell since he felt like it would take away from the song.
Last edited by HWB; 01-12-2017 at 01:00 PM.
I know the Broken meaning, and it doesn't take anything from me just due to the existence of the Broken movie, you can look at the EP as prequel to The Downward Spiral, perhaps it's a story about the mindest of a serial killer. It is possible to ignore the original meaning and still listen to it with your own in your head.
I think this improved The Slip a lot for me, no context, we only know how it was done, the production, but we ourselves, if we cared enough, to figure out its potetional story it had beneath. Same for Hesitation Marks which with closer look it can be seen as a straight sequel to The Downward Spiral.
I've had conversations with musicians and industry people who think the internet ruined the mystery and magic of music. I can see why some would think that but Reznor has mastered using the internet to build suspense and create excitement. He baited us with one tweet and took a year to follow through.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Not to mention how magnificantly the album still seems mysterious with its creepy title, artworks with two of them calling back to Still, with some lyrics intentionally not appearing on the tracks, adding just more mystery to the thing.
Also, don't forget how amazingly Trent used the ARG for Year Zero to make the world that is in the album feel much bigger too.
So yesterday i was riding in the car listening to Burning Bright when we drove past...
an actual fucking field on fire, no shit. Like a wildfire trying to start and they were working hard to contain it and shit.
There was so much smoke. We stopped and i took a bunch of pictures of it.
It was pretty fucking surreal.
Seeing as to how secretive TR is currently being about the theme of the EP, @kraw isn't going to be the one to explain the artwork/themes/direction until it comes from TR. I'm sure after physical components and vinyl have been delivered, TR will shed some more light and then @kraw can talk about what TR was wanting as far as artwork.
Then again...all of it might just confuse us more and we'll keep talking about it!!
I actually like how TR is forcing us to be patient...probably just "good-ol-days-syndrome/pre-internet days."
I was thinking that maybe what we are gettig is a deconstructed version of what the anniversary super deluxe was going to be, and for whatever reason, didn't happen.
The fragile instrumentals, deviations, reissue in vinyl, still era artwork...
It would be cool if everything about this ep made sense when the physical thingy arrives.
Maybe he meant it figuratively. But I can understand the anger and despair considering the current state of things in the world, especially if you have children (I don't)... what kind of world will they live in?
I know this, but have you seen the lyrics that were left out, especially from Branches/Bones and She's Gone Away?
They don't look like lyrics, or something that'd fit into a song, I know this is a thing Trent did, but there is too much stuff left out. , I mean, just look at this
finding order almost everything of you
yes i have been here before
yes i guess thought i was
my proven false in false in one
all of you but the way actual events a way of finding mattered
what i thought of finding order almost of you
i guess have a way of comfort in the past events
but the way like I’ve been here the past not the but the way
i of myself has proven before allowing myself to almost everything i thought events
but the way sense of comfort in what i thought
i have a way of actual events but
the mattered what i thought the actual events
but the actual events but been here before allowing of myself
has proven in one way guess things have a
of finding order almost my definition of myself
you all of you myself to feel a feel a sense of thought
i was my thought mattered what i have proven false
to remember them and comfort in the past
and you all of way of finding order you
i guess things all of you i of myself has proven of myself has proven
the way i choose in one way or i guess things have order almost everything
i myself to feel a not the actual events in the past
not remember them and you feels like I’ve been you
i guess things i thought mattered what here before allowing myself
way i choose to of finding order almost of finding order
almost or another and you all of before allowing myself
to allowing myself to feel way of finding order
of myself has proven my definition of myself
please go away from here
please all of you
i past not the actual
like I’ve been here in one way
or myself has proven false
guess things have
please go
please
please
please
yes i have been here before ΄
I feel like it'd be possible, with quite a bit of work, to unscramble this and severely pare it down to a small coherent paragraph, by slowly identifying 'definite' portions of text, like 'Not The Actual Events' or isolating repeated sentence fragments and trying to line them up together.
It's been bugging the crap out of me since the release but I can't find the time to sit down and try to decode it.
Last edited by Shadaloo; 01-12-2017 at 04:34 PM. Reason: Trying to do so now
@Sesquipedalism did i miss your next big wall of text? how many interpretations have you blessed us with at this point?
I hope you are not being too serious about it and you don't really think that my supercover for NIN's next album pretended to be a professional looking work when I spent just a few seconds on it with an online photoshop tool and I'm obviously not going to be paid for it (I can accept paypal donations though) and it was just a silly joke.
And I'm in my mid 30s, I'm lucky enough to don't need a new job, and there are no Valmarts in Europe afaik, at least not in my country.
Look, I'm not going to get into an endless internet discussion with a guy who works for Trent Reznor in a NIN's fan message board, I didn't want to hurt your feelings or be offensive towards your professionality, I just wondered why the fuck a huge name like NIN (we are not talking about some small amateur band) would reuse the artwork from a previous release for a new one, it just doesn't make any sense to me when Reznor has just hired a guy like you who is a professional designer, and you are good at your job (I checked your instagram page and your personal site when a thread linking both was opened here to talk about you), so you should understand that some of us are confused about this and some of us may not like it, because I would have prefered to see something new for this new ep, something made by you that didn't consist in copypasting AATCHB's and Still's covers and apply different filters to them.
Maybe there was no time for a new cover, maybe Trent is trying to troll his fans, maybe he doesn't remember all the covers of his previous albums, I don't know, I just said that I just don't like it, and you should accept it and understand that maybe a guy like me is not clever enough to understand this or maybe it was just a dumb idea, or maybe I just don't know the details of why this choice was made and that's why I don't get it, or maybe this is it, there is no meaning after it and I just don't like it.
The guy who made the cover for HTDA's first ep just rehashed some of his own previous works and it looked pretty good, and at least it wasn't the PHM cover with a different title. Iirc he even did a cover for the first single consisting in one of his previous works with Q's face on it, and I didn't like it too much tbh, but at least it was not the cover for the "Closer To God" single with her face on it. He recycled some of his own work for HTDA, but it looked good (the ep cover, the single cover not so much imo) and the huge majority of Reznor's fans had no idea that it was not a completely new and original work exclusively done for HTDA. And I thought that it was legit that he used some of his own previous stuff for HTDA, that's better than using somebody else's work that has already been used in a previous NIN release without giving a single explanation and expecting that the fans just shut up about it instead of asking themselves why the fuck this choice was made when Reznor had just hired a new art director that should bring something new or at least of his own instead of recycling a previous cover made by someone else.
I would have even prefered this over the current cover:
It's ok if you don't share my point of view, but you should be professional and mature enough to accept that I have the right to have my own opinion and that it's completely logical that some of us (I think I'm not the only one) don't understand why NTAE's cover is a copypaste of AATCHB's and Still's covers. I had to check it out a few times because I just couldn't believe it, and that's why I was saying that maybe once the vinyls and the "physical components" arrived we would find out that we had just seen a temporary cover(s) and the actual cover would be something different and new made by you, but now I guess I can forget about it after seeing your reaction to my guessings. XD
I hope to see your own original work in the following releases and that it's awesome because I'm a huge NIN fan (and a potential fan of your future works, I've already said that I've liked what I've seen in your sites), although I'm still open to "quit Valmart" and do the job myself if Trent pays me , I promise that I'll be more careful choosing the right font.
Last edited by Kooler Than Jesus; 01-12-2017 at 07:17 PM.
I don't think it's a big mystery why he chose to reuse the Still cover along with all the other variations. It's most likely for the same or similar reasons that he brought Russell Mills back to do the artwork for Hesitation Marks: to suggest a connection between the two albums. Just because he hasn't SAID what that connection is doesn't mean it's pointless.