Nine Inch Nails Y34RZ3R0R3MIX3D
What’s this now? Another Nine Inch Nails remix album? And half of the tracks sound like Justice remixes for the electro hipster pedigree? Sadly, yes.Year Zero was an important album for Trent Reznor, a return to form after the uneven With Teeth, so here we have the latest slicing and dicing of Nails material offered up to such eclectic tastes as The Faint, Ladytron, Kronos Quartet and another batch of names You’ve likely not heard of.
This album is the result of a very proactive approach to the remix process that Trent has undertaken, having been offering up the raw samples and tracks used to create Year Zero on his website, this CD/DVD package includes a DVD with the necessary Ableton Live / Garage Band files necessary to make your own remixes of these tracks.
Here we see most of the Year Zero tracks changed to unrecognizable extends, with mixed results. ModWheelMoods mix is well done, Kronos Quarted beautifully slices up Another Version of Truth, and Vessel is interestingly mutilated into a weighty techno mashing piece. Unfortunately some of the other experiments seem to only appeal to some “how far from the original can we push this” sensibilities, such as Olof Dreijer’s ridiculously dull, minimal, 14 minute take on Me, I’m Not.
To his credit, it’s still great to see someone with a large amount on influence promoting a D.I.Y approach to remixing and continuing to try and see music from different perspectives and angles, it’s only a shame there wasn’t more interesting and memorable material here.