The Cold and Black and Infinite Brick Road (The Trilogy syncs to The Wizard of Oz)

[Madisondisco]

Link to full synced video:
When making Not The Actual Events, Add Violence, and Bad Witch, I’m convinced that Trent Reznor had the idea in mind for it to sink to The Wizard of Oz. Playing it through is just too perfect and there are alot of movement syncs, lyric parallels, and overall tonal compliments.
Trent has said in an interview “I like the depth. With the new EPs, I liked world-building, and writing music that can sit in that world. I was always the guy who desperately wanted the Dark Side of the Moon to line up with The Wizard of Oz. I wanted to believe somebody was so far out of their mind that they figured that out. Fuck, I got goose bumps just thinking about that possibility right now — the idea that someone could be thinking so hard about an album.”
So is it beyond the realm of possibility he did that with the Trilogy? Only Trent knows.
NOTE: The sync starts when Dorothy’s house lands in Oz. It just seems fitting that it already starts when she’s in an unknown, unfamiliar world and already “asleep”.
I did some breakdowns of the first EP, but didn’t go into detail on the rest, but it all works so freakin well. How can you listen to She’s Gone Away syncing with the death of the Wicked Witch of the East and not get a little suspicious?
Decide for yourself.

00:00:00 - BRACNCHES/BONES The first note of The Trilogy starts the moment dorothy’s house lands in Oz.
00:00:56 - As Dorothy steps out of the house and into Oz, Trent sings “Feels like I’ve been here before, but I don’t know anymore”. This has been a place Dorothy has dreamed and sang about, but now feels strange to actually be here.
00:01:56 - DEAR WORLD “Yes, everyone seems to be asleep”. Dorothy looks around to see nobody, but something is rustling in the bushes.
00:02:16 - When Dorothy turns around to see Glinda the Good Witch’s bubble coming towards here, a soft little synth effect chimes.
00:04:03 - The “Dear World” that comes after the short pause aligns when Glinda finally asks the munchkins to come out.
00:06:04 - SHE’S GONE AWAY - This is the moment Glinda announces the Witch of the East is dead. The munchkins celebrate
00:06:29 - Slow drum machine kicks in - the munchkin army is marching triumphantly
00:07:34 - The coroner shows the declaration that the witch is dead. Trent sings here for the first time “She’s gone, she’s gone, she’s gone away”
00:07:57 - Trent’s first emotional moan is aligned with the munchkin town cheering
00:12:02 - THE IDEA OF YOU - Wicked Witch of the West has just vanished. Dorothy now knows her mission and must go to the emerald city to go back to her idea of her.
00:13:23 - second verse kicks off when Glina leaves.
00:13:47 - The second chorus “WAIT NONE OF THIS IS HAPPENING” starts when Dorothy steps on the Yellow Brick Road. And she’s right, none of this is happening.
00:15:10 - Trent sings “it gets so lonely in here”. This is the first time that Dorothy has not been with anyone else. She’s not with the munchkins and she still hasn’t met the scarecrow.
00:15:31 - BURNING BRIGHT (FIELD OF FIRE) - This starts the first time Dorothy actually sees the Scarecrow move.
00:16:29 - As they’re talking Trent is singing “Look at this pathetic place I made With little bits of sticks and hair, and anything I found along the way”. The scarecrow has been stuck on his post, with sticks and hay, and will finally get down with Dorothy’s help, and back to who he “really was”.
00:17:38 - When the scarecrow realizes he is free and stands up, Trent sings ”I am forgiven, I am Free, I am a field on fire”
00:21:20 - LESS THAN - The trees begin throwing apples stirring up a little violence
00:24:52 - THE LOVERS - The Tin Man reveals that he wants a heart and wants Dorothy and he Scarecrow to “take him” to the wizard.
00:29:00 - THIS ISN’T THE PLACE - The three of them are frightened of the woods, and encounter the Lion.
00:33:46 - NOT ANYMORE - The Four begin their journey to the Wizard, but the Witch through her crystal ball has other plans. [The “I can’t seem to wake up” occurs when they fall asleep in the flowers]
00:36:50 - THE BACKGROUND WORLD - Dorothy and the Lion fall asleep, but Gilda wakes them up. [‘Are you sure this is what you want’ occurs when they knock on the emerald city doors. Just listen to that drum machine sounding just like bells and knocks on a door]]
00:48:35 - SHIT MIRROR - The guard closes the door on Dorothy to the wizard’s chamber, but eventually lets them in. [New World, New Times kicks in when they finally step in]
00:51:42 - AHEAD OF OURSELVES - Dorothy and the rest are terrified, maybe even possibly regretting their decision to come by thinking “they were ahead of ourselves”. They need the wizards help, because they can’t help themselves. The Wizard tasks them on their quest to the witch.
00:55:13 - PLAY THE GODDAMNED PART - The Four are in the haunted woods and the Tin Man gets swooped up. The Witch intervenes now and attempts to stop them.
01:00:04 - GOD BREAK DOWN THE DOOR - Song kicks in when Dorothy goes to the crystal ball, but the Witch appears in it. These are not the answers she was looking for. Tin Man, Lion, and Scarecrow now must break down the castle doors to save Dorothy.
01:04:22 - IM NOT FROM THIS WORLD - Scarecrow, Tinman, and Lion finally get inside to save Dorothy and stop the Witch so they can return to the World they knew.
01:11:04 - OVER AND OUT - They return the wizard, but they discover who he really is. The song starts when he starts delivering to the group what they asked for. The song ends, not when Dorothy wakes up, but when she learns that she could have left at any time.

[Sarah K]

I can't tell if this is a troll or not and I can't watch or listen to this right now. But omg if true. That is my favorite movie ever.

To add to your theory - Todd Slater stated that the print he did in Vegas was Wizard of Oz inspired, and is titled "Bad Witch".

My theme for the print is a sort of dystopian Wizard of Oz. I put a lot of thought into the symbolism. Looking at the print you can see a brick road going to nowhere. There's a prism in the distance that represents the emerald city, the dark side of the moon and Vegas itself. You can see a city skyline faintly back there as well. The tin man, lion and scarecrow are now 3 wolves and the flying monkey is a vulture in a dead tree.
.

FINALLY! An ETS Conspiracy™ that I can get into!

[BRoswell]

I've seen this done with plenty of music over the years. It can be interesting, but none of it ever comes across as intentional. The idea of Trent & Atticus making the trilogy as some sort of soundtrack to The Wizard Of Oz would kind of cheapen the whole thing in my opinion.

For the record, I never thought The Dark Side Of The Moon synced up that well to The Wizard Of Oz. It was something that was more interesting in theory than in practice.

[ImTheWiseJanitor]

I've seen this done with plenty of music over the years. It can be interesting, but none of it ever comes across as intentional. The idea of Trent & Atticus making the trilogy as some sort of soundtrack to The Wizard Of Oz would kind of cheapen the whole thing in my opinion.

Seconded. And as a Kansas resident for 28 years, I’m gettin’ reeeally tired of everything under the sun being synced to The Wizard of Oz. I feel like it’s a tired gimmick by now. If I picked any album on my shelf right now and picked the right starting moments, I’m sure a case can be made for any of them that they “sync” with the movie. Just because it syncs well doesn’t mean there’s a hard connection. It is interesting, sure, but - if you stare at anything hard enough, you’ll see connections that aren’t there. The brain sees what it wants to see. Maybe I’m wrong and NIN is finally deciding to sync with Wizard of Oz for some odd reason, but...that seems unlikely to me. I’d prefer thinking the trilogy stands on its own. Or at least that if it IS connected to anything, it’s something that isn’t as tired and cliche as The Wizard of Oz.

When Trent starts singing in GBDTD, it’s the exact moment Toto barks at Dorothy’s entourage. Trent is a dog, confirmed.

[BRoswell]

I did that sort of thing in high school with different films and albums. It's a fun way to waste time (if you're into film/music editing, that is), but I never came away from it thinking "oh yeah, they totally did this on purpose". The fact that Trent & Atticus have been scoring films for the past eight years also tells me that it would be a waste of time on their part.

[Steven]

My bet is that TR/AR did just enough editing to the music for the songs to sync up to the Wizard of Oz, but their main goal was still to create the songs the way they wanted to.

[zecho]

You could literally play any music to any movie and something will sync. The fact that almost no key changes or dynamic changes are synced to anything at all should be enough to discredit this, not to mention having to start the music on an arbitrary scene instead of the beginning of the movie just to make some of it fit. On top of that, most of the supposed syncs are completely arbitrary, with no thought to what constitutes a sync, just a description of what happens. Example:

00:16:29 - As they’re talking Trent is singing “Look at this pathetic place I made With little bits of sticks and hair, and anything I found along the way”. The scarecrow has been stuck on his post, with sticks and hay, and will finally get down with Dorothy’s help, and back to who he “really was”.

So, despite the fact that there's no musical sync, the vague allusions from lyrics that are similar (but don't quite fit) to describing a scarecrow is enough to imagine a sync? If I was secretly syncing music to a movie, I'd focus on matching the instrumentation to scene transitions and actual action on the screen instead of almost solely basing the "syncing" around lyrics and dialogue that isn't even audible if listening to music over the movie. This entire thing is just looking far too hard at something that's clearly not there. Even the place the idea comes from (a throw away comment about Pink Floyd in an interview) is just so ridiculous. You really think that NIN would ever just recreate something another band has done? No, that goes against the very foundation the band was built upon, trying to push into new territory, making unique, original music, etc. If they ever made an album to sync with a movie, don't you think it would be literally anything else first? With hundreds of thousands of movies available, they'd sync their music to the most famously synced movie of all time? No, that's an absolutely insane thing to expect.

This kind of thing always frustrates me, especially with the time and effort someone has put into this. I can't believe they didn't stop when they couldn't find syncs at the beginning of the movie. Instead, they started the syncing somewhere else to force there to besomething to find, instead of acting like a sane person and finding that their idea was wrong. It's a neat experiment to try, but come the fuck on. This shit is a delusion. And it frustrates me as well to see how many people are so desperate to believe something that's clearly untrue. Maybe I'm coming across as harsh, but it always frustrates me when a band that has as much depth to talk about as NIN has the conversation dominated by convoluted bullshit theories instead of an actual discussion. You know how many of these ridiculously complicated theories about the secret meanings and puzzles behind the music have ever been true? Zero. Not once has it ever happened with any music ever made by NIN, ever. Even the Year Zero puzzles were less convoluted.

I mean, come on, obviously the real secret to the trilogy is to play them backwards from the beginning of the credits over Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret Of The Ooze. I mean come on, the allusions are obvious! People being just another type of animal, like turtles, the theme of mutation, both referring to the teenage mutant ninja turtles, and to the effects of the titular ooze. The hand on the cover is obviously a humorous subversion of the Foot Clan, while the mutated dandelions in the movie (or flowers of naïvety, if you will) clearly go hand in hand with how we as humans have gotten ahead of ourselves with our scientific advancements without having grown as a people as well. And of course, the kicker: what is the modern equivalent to a cave wall that we could see shadows on? That's right, FUCKING SEWER TUNNELS! I don't know how no one but me has noticed this! Puzzle solved, fellow NINerds!

[paul_guyet]

[FULLMETAL]

I'll be the skeptic. If the film had spiders or infected Japanese, then I'd be all in.

[katara]

No.

[bobbie solo]

Nope.

[BenAkenobi]

00:29:00 - THIS ISN’T THE PLACE - The three of them are frightened of the woods, and encounter the Lion.

...a single thin straight Lion.

Now i believe you!

[Kulerage]

Any two things will sync up if you really want them to.

[onthewall2983]

For the record, I never thought The Dark Side Of The Moon synced up that well to The Wizard Of Oz. It was something that was more interesting in theory than in practice.

This is the only one that matters.

[wizfan]

[eversonpoe]

here's my question about The Wizard Of Oz & Dark Side Of The Moon - did they have a screening room and a print of the film? because they worked on the album in 1972, and betamax didn't come out until 1975, so they would have had no other way of watching it and making sure the music synced up to the film, which basically debunks the theory completely. unless they actually did somehow have a print of the film and a way to screen it.

[botley]

here's my question about The Wizard Of Oz & Dark Side Of The Moon - did they have a screening room and a print of the film?

Well, no, but that alone isn't the final nail in the coffin. Pink Floyd had composed music for several films up to that point, but in each case the directors used their completed tracks and 'dropped in' their work with a dubbing mixer for use as cues on the soundtrack. You'd think, after several projects like this, the band would be capable of sustaining the underscore for a whole film... BUT one must keep in mind also that this was before the perfection of timecode-locked technology to synchronize two analogue reels together; there was no way in 1972 to reliably synchronize multitrack tape with an existing print of film (given that both media would have naturally varying speeds and no readily available timecode sync, at this point), they'd certainly fall way out of sync with each other over the course of 10 minutes -- let alone an entire album.

It's amazing enough that they managed with 1972 technology to incorporate as many sound effects, cross-fades, and other gadgetry into the album as they did, WITHOUT having to make the whole damn thing sync up with a movie as well.

[elevenism]

The Prodigy Experience syncs to Mario Kart 64. Seriously.
But I highly doubt it was intentional.

Edit: while I don't think the trilogy purposely syncs to TWoO, I DO think the movie was on his mind and inspired the title of Bad Witch, and, more importantly, I think he would probably approve of people THINKING it syncs up to something and TRYING it, based on that quote (the one in the first post of the thread.)

So, yeah, good show. @Madisondisco

[zecho]

The Prodigy Experience syncs to Mario Kart 64. Seriously.
But I highly doubt it was intentional.

Edit: while I don't think the trilogy purposely syncs to TWoO, I DO think the movie was on his mind and inspired the title of Bad Witch, and, more importantly, I think he would probably approve of people THINKING it syncs up to something and TRYING it, based on that quote (the one in the first post of the thread.)

So, yeah, good show. @Madisondisco

How does an album sync with a game? It's a dynamic experience with no set moments of action to sync to and the time to complete varies from player to player dramatically. Do you just mean that it goes well with the game, or is there something else going on?

[HurtinMinorKey]

This is the only one that matters.

This is the only one of Floyd's that I am convinced was deliberate. And once you see it, it's not worth going back to the original score. Echoes is just soo much better for the scene. So damn good.

[elevenism]

How does an album sync with a game? It's a dynamic experience with no set moments of action to sync to and the time to complete varies from player to player dramatically. Do you just mean that it goes well with the game, or is there something else going on?

Ha. Actually, the races take about the same amount of time each time. imagine people who play the game a lot, starting at a certain time and going through the levels at basically top speed. It becomes fairly uniform.
When you're on the donkey Kong stage, it plays Ruff in the Jungle Bizzness.
Out of Space plays when you're on Rainbow Road.
It's things like that.

Now I can't say I remember which cup or cups you play or when exactly you start it, but it DOES work.

I also once met someone who had noticed the same thing and we became fast and lifelong friends because of it.

Edit: i don't mean "ha" like I'm laughing at you man, it's just that the subject is so fucking goofy.
Also, I DO know that however you play it to get it to work right, it's in a natural order. It's just that it's been like 20 years since I did it

[Steven]

Most convincing/related moments we're when the wicked witch shows up during She's Gone Away, Scarecrow jumps during the chorus of Burning Bright, Less Than (Did it fix what was wrong with with? when they were helping Tin Man). Also Tin Man, Scarecrow, and Cowardly Lion climbing during God Break Down The Door worked well together. I'm Not From This World during the final fight with the Witch.

I think there's something to it honestly.

[onthewall2983]

This is the only one of Floyd's that I am convinced was deliberate. And once you see it, it's not worth going back to the original score. Echoes is just soo much better for the scene. So damn good.

I'm convinced it was too, but I go back and forth on it and the original score. I'm enough of a film buff to appreciate the original intent.

[botley]

I'm a big Stanley Kubrick fan, and I love the Pink Floyd track, but that is yet another pure coincidence where they happen to line up as well as they do. It's nice to watch because they're both relatively the same length, unlike DSoTM/Wizard of Oz which is gruelling to sit through all the way as it loops over and over (even if you're in a theatre full of stoners).

Speaking of "original intent", Kubrick did intend to use some Pink Floyd in A Clockwork Orange (you can see Atom Heart Mother's album cover in the futuristic record store) but they turned him down, apparently. I have no idea why... Nick Mason has said that the band were just being 'petulant' when Roger Waters vetoed the idea because Kubrick wanted carte blanche to use it however he liked. Remember, this was after 2001: A Space Odyssey had come out, for which the Floyd had 'wanted to' do the soundtrack but never did.

[HurtinMinorKey]

I'm a big Stanley Kubrick fan, and I love the Pink Floyd track, but that is yet another pure coincidence where they happen to line up as well as they do. It's nice to watch because they're both relatively the same length, unlike DSoTM/Wizard of Oz which is gruelling to sit through all the way as it loops over and over (even if you're in a theatre full of stoners).

Speaking of "original intent", Kubrick did intend to use some Pink Floyd in A Clockwork Orange (you can see Atom Heart Mother's album cover in the futuristic record store) but they turned him down, apparently. I have no idea why... Nick Mason has said that the band were just being 'petulant' when Roger Waters vetoed the idea because Kubrick wanted carte blanche to use it however he liked. Remember, this was after 2001: A Space Odyssey had come out, for which the Floyd had 'wanted to' do the soundtrack but never did.

I don't think there is a chance it's a coincidence. The thematic shifts in both the music and lyrics are just too synchronized to be coincidental. Sure, Pink Floyd has never owned up to it publicly, but I think there are IP law issues that have clearly kept them quiet.

[botley]

What issues would those be?

[BRoswell]

I think Echoes plays nicely over that sequence, but I don't think it was intentional. It's not difficult for a track like that to fit over a collage of images and light. I mean, I layered God Break Down The Door over it for fun and it fit pretty well too over its run time, but that doesn't mean it was designed with that scene in mind.

[HurtinMinorKey]

What issues would those be?

I believe they can get sued for copyright if the music is shown to be based on the film, and/or if they used a stolen copy/bootleg of the film to do it.

I think Echoes plays nicely over that sequence, but I don't think it was intentional. It's not difficult for a track like that to fit over a collage of images and light. I mean, I layered God Break Down The Door over it for fun and it fit pretty well too over its run time, but that doesn't mean it was designed with that scene in mind.

There are 8 distinct parts of the song than line up with transitions in the film. The lyrics are relevant. The themes of the music line up very well (but that is of course more subjective). The monolith has it's own theme music for Christ's sake! And then there is the whole exact timing of the song and the overall time of the last scene.

I'm kinda baffled that people could watch it and think it's not intentional, but skepticism is always healthy.

[BRoswell]

I believe they can get sued for copyright if the music is shown to be based on the film, and/or if they used a stolen copy/bootleg of the film to do it.

I don't think either of those things are true actually. You can't really sue someone for using your film as a basis for a track unless you sample it directly or use it as part of the title, and even then, things are a bit murky. As far as having a bootleg of the film, there would be no way to prove who had it, where it came from, and where it went after they allegedly used it. Not a lot of evidence to go on there, and certainly not worth the time to investigate or hide that they did it.

Beyond that, the logistics of doing this sort of thing at that time kind of work against the idea. They would have had to find a 35mm print of the film, found a space where they could screen the film AND play in time to it AND also project the film properly (it was shot anamorphically, which would require a special lens for the projector to remove the distortion caused by the anamorphic process). Not impossible, but that would take a lot of effort on their part, and if it did, why hide that they did it? Where's the mystery in that? The fact that they denied doing it for The Wizard Of Oz tells me that it's not something they had much interest in to begin with.

[botley]

I believe they can get sued for copyright if the music is shown to be based on the film, and/or if they used a stolen copy/bootleg of the film to do it.

No, they can't. What would be the threshold for evidence to establish that? There's no precedent for such a claim that I know. If they tried to distribute their own version of the film with the soundtrack replaced with "Echoes", then that would be a different matter.

I'm kinda baffled that people could watch it and think it's not intentional, but skepticism is always healthy.

As I said already, it was extremely difficult to even attempt to intentionally synchronize tape to film for that long in the early 70s. The band were composing in multiple studios with various pieces of music stitched together to form the suite, and the technical challenges associated with this were already pretty immense, even without precisely timing it all to film. It's nearly impossible that this would be an intentional, conscious effort on the band's part to make 23 minutes of music match an existing film so precisely.