Nine Inch Nails mastermind Trent Reznor appeared on Beats 1 Radio earlier today (July 13th) to discuss the band’s upcoming live shows and their newly announced EP “Add Violence“, which will hit stores next week on July 21st. Speaking of the EP and overall planned trilogy of EP’s, of which this is the second entry, Reznor offered [transcribed by Theprp.com]:
“There’s a story behind this record. When Atticus and I sat down to—over the last couple years we’ve been accumulating ideas and thinking about Nine Inch Nails and what the big statement was, what the next proper album was—while we were doing some score stuff.
And rather than drop a big long—I mean I love the format of an album. I like having 40 minutes to 90 minutes to communicate a grand suite of songs that relate to each other and have something to say beyond the single song serving.
But we were thinking about the amount of time it takes to do that and a bit of awareness about what it’s like as a fan with so much choice, so much access to so much music. We thought it might be interesting to split the record up into three parts that come out and have their own moment of attention—each of which are stylistically a bit different.
And then it tells a singular story, we’re gonna combine things in a way that makes sense after the three EP’s are out. This is part two of that. It’s been more fun and inspiring to work that way.”
The blueprint of this suite of records has been starting with the kind of script—the lyrical construct, the world that they sit in. And then really following inspiration in the studio to find out musically what kind of feels inspiring at that time. When we did “Not The Actual Events“, we were really seduced by the violence, the aggression. The kind of throwing “Hesitation Marks” out the window and being unafraid to explore approaches we had in the past with the kind of punch in the face feel to it.
And I think with the length of the five-song EP, felt like the right length for that. And to repeat that isn’t as exciting anymore. We did that. As we expand the lyrical viewpoint of this three-song trilogy, the music that is interesting us this time around kind of surprised us and “Less Than” is not entirely representative of what the rest of the EP does.
But this collection of five songs feels like brothers and I have no idea what the last part of this will be. I know lyrically where it goes, but I don’t know what it’s gonna sound like yet.”
Reznor later went on to describe the stage production for the band’s upcoming live shows as being ‘anti-technology’ themed due to originally not expecting to perform live this year. Of that, he stated:
“I think what you’re gonna see from us this time is kind of anti-technology, has been the kind of thought behind it.”
“We’re trying to play to our strengths and also to provide something that feels… There’s something special about the live performance—I don’t mean just us—the experience of seeing a live act. Being in the moment, it’s not downloadable. You’re there, the anticipation, the disappointment. The over-priced drink, the need to urinate, all those things—the bad live sound.
I think a lot of that has turned into… The live performances today have become watching a movie. Kind of overstimulation—it’s a arms race for sensory overload.”
He added:
“We’re into just applying a different thing and seeing how that goes. And we might find that it was a terrible idea and we won’t repeat that. But it feels exciting and it feels unsafe for us and it doesn’t feel like just doing the same thing we stopped doing last time.”
He went on to say that outside of some lyrics in a notebook, there’s 0% progress been made to the third EP of the trilogy with plans for it’s eventual release still a bit flexible as Reznor and Ross are also currently weighing other film scoring projects. In other news, it seems that a CD version of the band’s previous EP release, “Not The Actual Events“, is set for a September 01st release date with pre-orders up on Amazon.
Current Nine Inch Nails live dates include:
07/23 Los Angeles, CA – FYF Fest
07/30 Brooklyn, NY – Panorama Fest
09/15 Chicago, IL – Riot Fest
10/21 Sacramento, CA – Aftershock Festival
