http://www.factmag.com/2013/05/02/new-nine-inch-nails-song-coming-next-month/ Apparently there was a rumor earlier in the month that a new song could be coming June 6th. I'd never heard of this.
He sounds really excited. The music should be phenomenal. I still don't get the decision to team up with a label after all his bad-mouthing and financial success going solo.
He already addressed this in a Reddit AMA I believe. The gist of it was that the amount of effort that goes into manufacturing, distribution and marketing of music is best left to professionals. Obviously he has an agreement with Columbia over creative control, though. Trent would never allow himself to be boxed in again.
He had no marketing for Ghosts and made a fortune. Obviously the contract must be vastly different than most or else I don't see the sense of it from a monetary perspective.
Wow, that's awesome! It's been a fucking while since he released new stuff with NIN. Very excited to hear this!
Ghosts wasn't really something that needed marketing. It wasn't something that was going to be played on the radio or a big seller. The majority of people who were going to buy it were hardcore NIN fans, which is why the digital release route was more worthwhile. Obviously he feels it's worth it for someone else to handle the manufacturing, distribution and marketing for him. He wouldn't saddle up with them if he didn't.
I'm sure the music is going to be great but I personally can't stand Reznor's singing so I'm not overly excited for this.
That's what turned me off from his music for a long time. I didn't start listening to him until I was out of high school about 7 years ago. Eventually my tastes changed and I realized a talented vocalist is extremely common and the instrumental is what makes the artist really stand out. And how well the instrumental meshes with the vocals (if there are any). Vocal ability lost most of its importance to me. Reznor is a genius musician and a well below average professional vocalist, but his ungodly insane instrumentals go incredibly well with his voice and he emotes better than mostly anyone I've heard. This creates something astounding to me that is much more special than a great vocalist with a run-of-the-mill band. Edit: Putting emotion into instrumentals is becoming a lost art the bigger this generation of Pop music becomes. Pop people want catchy lyrics or vocal melodies they can get stuck in their head. They hardly notice or care about the rest of the band. Maynard James Keenan and Tool/APC give me a similar feeling that Trent does with his music. Even though Maynard is one of the best vocalists ever, it's their haunting and devastating instrumentals that draw me in. Maynard's emoting with his voice is much more important to me than his skill level which is just an added benefit. TL;DR - vocal ability is overrated. Trent is god.
I agree with most of your post, except for the "pop" part. Even a catchy pop instrumental can be full of emotions, as long as it is well executed. At least I think so. I was just listening to a french hip hop song which isn't really anything but a modern gangsta rap beat repeated over and over again with some MC mceein over. But I can guarantee you can feel the passion through it, it really makes me feel something. But anyway yes, I think the most important is not the vocal ability but how well the vocals match the instrumental. And in that regard NIN stands out at the top of the game to me.
How much "emotion" a beat packs is entirely subjective. Nine Inch Nails' body of work is largely pop music, even if you don't call yourself a "pop" person.
He made a fortune with the help of the 2,500 ultra limited edition packages that were over $300 (around $750k). Without that, it'd just be another instrumental album that did "okay". At this point in the game, I have complete faith in Trent. If he wants to sign to a major label, so be it. He's a smart guy, and like Mark said, he's not going to let himself be boxed in again like he was with TVT and to a lesser extent, Interscope.
I thought I read Ghosts raked in $3 million for Trent in the first couple weeks. I may or may not be remembering that right, though.
He had a number of different priced "_____ editions" of the album, plus the pay what you want method he used with Saul Williams, and Radiohead popularized. The $300 edition was just the highest priced, super limited edition. I think there was like 4 different physical copies of the album, plus the digital version. He probably did make around that figure all together, but that was with a number of different versions of the album. It's not like he released one standard album by himself and instantly made $3 million.