Year Zero 2022

[sonic_discord]

Perhaps a sequel to Year Zero could be on the other side of the spectrum (at least at first). After the collapse of modern society, there could be a return to a more primitive nature and the record could sound more primal with more analog instruments – real drums & guitars, less electronics. I still love the glitchy sound of Year Zero and it's so ingrained in the DNA of that album that it's hard to imagine a potential follow-up abandoning that element altogether. But maybe the album begins devoid of that sound and it creeps in slowly as the album going on (and as society builds itself back up). The theme of the album could be that society is cyclical in nature and even though we keep building towards something great, we are destined/doomed to destroy ourselves and our demise (at our own hands) is inevitable. History repeats itself. Kind of like the themes of Terminator 2 & 3 ("It's in your nature to destroy yourselves."). But Maybe that's too similar to the latest Ghost album, Impera, which is about Empires rising and ultimately falling.

[snaapz]

I remember BOTP and Rob stating at different times they were really surprised that the fans didn't pick up on certain things, or find clues that were out in the open. I have always wondered what these might be and what little trinkets may still be out there. (I get most of the websites are now defunct, but still)

Easy for him to say, I believe we figured out many complicated things. I still have no idea who the hell decided to view that static in a spectrogram format. I wonder how much nudging along the ARG team did.


As for Year Zero and current day, holy shit.... we live in a world where we all need injections or risk losing our jobs or other privileges, we have lockdowns, restrictions on travel, on the brink of WWIII, and hundreds of other terrible things happening.


Life on Earth sure went to hell.

[Reaps]

I was looking at a Year Zero fan made compilation album called '2022' i have on a drive that has all those audio files (Ball-game Over, Opalo, No hurry etc.) from the Year Zero ARG.

It's an interesting collection but of very low quality, is there a more comprehensive collection of material based around the YZ era out there or is this '2022' compilation the best that there is? Happy with it either way but just wondered.

[nmitchell86]

I was looking at a Year Zero fan made compilation album called '2022' i have on a drive that has all those audio files (Ball-game Over, Opalo, No hurry etc.) from the Year Zero ARG.

It's an interesting collection but of very low quality, is there a more comprehensive collection of material based around the YZ era out there or is this '2022' compilation the best that there is? Happy with it either way but just wondered.

What is this 2022 compilation? I've never heard of it.

[muad'nin]

I remember BOTP and Rob stating at different times they were really surprised that the fans didn't pick up on certain things, or find clues that were out in the open. I have always wondered what these might be and what little trinkets may still be out there. (I get most of the websites are now defunct, but still)

This was always my favourite (apologies for the text formatting) - some experimenting they did at live shows around the time of the LP’s release -

“It sounded better on paper than it actually did in the execution. But we had — I forget what they actually call them, but it's basically a focused cone of sound from these amusement parks and things so you could hear something in one corner but you don't — and if you get out of that very fine — if you were 30 feet away from here I could aim it at you and you'd hear it. If I aim it that way it disappears. So, we were trying to pump messages into people's heads at the show between acts. You'd be sitting back with this thing, aiming it, with an iPod with some scary message that we'd computer voiced — We'd look at people that we thought would be the kind of people we expected were probably online, you know, and try to target them. But we could never tell if they were really hearing it or not. Then I went out and hotrodded one up and put a bigger power amp on it. I was walking the line between — I was ready for smoke to come out of somebody's head. So, that was an idea that really didn't work as well as we thought. But we put a lot of effort into little things like that, to try to really make an experience that broke down the idea that you come and see concerts, two bands play, you drink a beer, you go to the bathroom, you go home.”

From https://www.wired.com/2007/12/ff-arg-reznor/

[jmtd]

I think I like the idea of the album more than I like listening to it. I like the concept of Trent using minimal tools at his disposal to create a record on the road, but in a way ... it really gives the album a dated sound. So many of the drums feel like a pattern/loop sample off something you'd get for free off of your newly installed GarageBand/ACID Pro software, and I just can't sink my teeth into the arrangements/production like I want to.

I feel kinda similar about the rigid structure of some of them. Lots of the songs come alive for me with the live takes: live drums, reverb, crowd ambience.