Trent Reznor: I Got $5 On It
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Artist:
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Album:The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust
C|Net reports:Very early in a discussion with Trent Reznor, the front man for the band Nine Inch Nails, it's obvious how highly he prizes his collaboration with musician Saul Williams on the album ??The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust??.Reznor produced and helped bankroll the album, which debuted November 1. All the more reason why he was stunned when fewer than one in five people who downloaded the music were willing to pony up $5, roughly the cost of a McDonald's Quarter Pounder. For more info "CLICK HERE":CH
??Reznor & Williams??Q: Trent, lots of fans were shocked and saddened by how disappointed you sounded with the sales results. Many piped up to tell you that the numbers may be misleading. Were the numbers that bad?Reznor: I'm not disappointed with the numbers with Saul at all. I think, particularly looking at what he's done historically and in the climate of today's music scene, that's something to be proud of. What disappointed me is that I had thought-and this is just based on how I experience music-given the opportunity (his voice trails off). Why do I end up stealing music? Usually because I can't get it easily somewhere else or the version I can get is an inferior one with DRM, perhaps, or I have to drive across town to get it to then put it on my computer or it's already out on the Internet and I can't pay for it yet.If I think of it a month later walking through Amoeba (record store), hmm...do I want to just buy a piece of plastic and give most of the money to the record labels, who have to be thieves because my experience with them has always been that? And you have a lot of reasons why you didn't do it. So I thought if you take all those away and here's the record in as great a quality as you could ever want, it's available now and it's offered for an insulting low price, which I consider $5 to be, I thought that it would appeal to more people than it did. That's where my sense of disappointment is in general, that the idea was wrong in my head and for once I've given people too much credit.Saul and I went at this thing with the right intentions. We wanted to put out the music that we believe in. We want to do it as unencumbered and as un-revenue-ad-generated and un-corporate-affiliated as possible. We wanted it without a string attached, without the hassle, without the bait and switch, or the "Now you can buy the s@#$ version if you buy..." No, no, we said: "Here it is. At the same time, it'd be nice if we can cover the costs and perhaps make a living doing it."I'm not saying that this is a completely accurate test. Yes, there is a possibility that people downloaded it and the same people went back and downloaded it and paid for it and that can throw the numbers off. I get all that.It kind of gets into the bigger picture that you've had to face as a musician over the last few years, which in my mind was a bitter pill to swallow, but it's pretty far down the hatch with me now: the way things are, I think music should be looked at as free. It basically is. The toothpaste is out of the tube and a whole generation of people is accustomed to music being that way. There's a perception that you don't pay for music when you hear it on the radio or MySpace.There's a difficult transition in the mind of the musician and certainly in the mind of the record label. If that is the case, how does one adapt to that?How are you going to adapt to that?Reznor: For me, I choose the battles I can fight. In my mind, I think if there was an ISP tax of some sort, we can say to the consumer, "All music is now available and able to be downloaded and put in your car and put in your iPod and put up your a-- if you want, and it's $5 on your cable bill or ISP bill." [CH]http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9847788-7.html?tag=newsmap
??Reznor & Williams??Q: Trent, lots of fans were shocked and saddened by how disappointed you sounded with the sales results. Many piped up to tell you that the numbers may be misleading. Were the numbers that bad?Reznor: I'm not disappointed with the numbers with Saul at all. I think, particularly looking at what he's done historically and in the climate of today's music scene, that's something to be proud of. What disappointed me is that I had thought-and this is just based on how I experience music-given the opportunity (his voice trails off). Why do I end up stealing music? Usually because I can't get it easily somewhere else or the version I can get is an inferior one with DRM, perhaps, or I have to drive across town to get it to then put it on my computer or it's already out on the Internet and I can't pay for it yet.If I think of it a month later walking through Amoeba (record store), hmm...do I want to just buy a piece of plastic and give most of the money to the record labels, who have to be thieves because my experience with them has always been that? And you have a lot of reasons why you didn't do it. So I thought if you take all those away and here's the record in as great a quality as you could ever want, it's available now and it's offered for an insulting low price, which I consider $5 to be, I thought that it would appeal to more people than it did. That's where my sense of disappointment is in general, that the idea was wrong in my head and for once I've given people too much credit.Saul and I went at this thing with the right intentions. We wanted to put out the music that we believe in. We want to do it as unencumbered and as un-revenue-ad-generated and un-corporate-affiliated as possible. We wanted it without a string attached, without the hassle, without the bait and switch, or the "Now you can buy the s@#$ version if you buy..." No, no, we said: "Here it is. At the same time, it'd be nice if we can cover the costs and perhaps make a living doing it."I'm not saying that this is a completely accurate test. Yes, there is a possibility that people downloaded it and the same people went back and downloaded it and paid for it and that can throw the numbers off. I get all that.It kind of gets into the bigger picture that you've had to face as a musician over the last few years, which in my mind was a bitter pill to swallow, but it's pretty far down the hatch with me now: the way things are, I think music should be looked at as free. It basically is. The toothpaste is out of the tube and a whole generation of people is accustomed to music being that way. There's a perception that you don't pay for music when you hear it on the radio or MySpace.There's a difficult transition in the mind of the musician and certainly in the mind of the record label. If that is the case, how does one adapt to that?How are you going to adapt to that?Reznor: For me, I choose the battles I can fight. In my mind, I think if there was an ISP tax of some sort, we can say to the consumer, "All music is now available and able to be downloaded and put in your car and put in your iPod and put up your a-- if you want, and it's $5 on your cable bill or ISP bill." [CH]http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9847788-7.html?tag=newsmap
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