I wondered what folks thought about the content of the campaign? I'm on board with everyone who appreciates the reappearance of the concept album, with its creation of an entire world or attempt to comment on the current world. But I'm struck by the merging of NIN's dystopia, which (in my admittedly glancing knowledge of their work) seems relatively apolitical, with the explicitly anti-totalitarian/humanist thrust of the concept pioneers like Pink Floyd et al.

What I find particularly striking is that this campaign seems like an interesting commentary on the US slide into Fascism in some potentially conflicting ways. If you head to the "parepin information" site, the content of those pages combines the 1950s paranoia regarding flouride in the water and nuclear threat with current concerns about the over-prescription of anti-depressants. On the one hand, this is a really smart comment on the way we're mired, once again, in Cold War poiltics, but on the other hand, it seems odd to then turn this political energy against a set of drugs that for many of us actually help to make us MORE emotionally present, more able to act in the real world, not less.

On another note, relative to the questions posed by Marchese, the image of the hand reaching down from the sky seems to exemplify the problems of whether viral marketing is simply another marketing gimmick wrapped up in an anti-market package. The image seems like a really smart comment on "The Invisible Hand." Adam Smith argued famously that the market was guided by an invisible moral force that emanated from its participants. But of course one of the things that has been clear under the current "The business of America is Business" policy of rampant deregulation, etc, of this administration is that Smith's Invisible Hand is distressingly similar to the face of Orwell's Big Brother -- in other words, that the market's driving moral force is ultimately complicit with oligarchic totalitarianism. But then is this just "the market" at play once again -- using viral marketing (ie underground strategies seemingly unlinked to visible institutions) to make an anti-market statement?

Incidentally, for you historical buffs out there, the anti-market marketing campaigns were born (you guessed it) in the fifties. The whole "be an individual -- buy our product!" thrust was born out of the same Cold War moment as anti-flouride anxiety.

Seems like we're having the same debate people have been having about Warhol for years now -- genius, or genius charlatan?

I've been a big fan since I was 15 (I am now 28). I think I own all the music and videos Trent Reznor has released over the years. I remember the excitement I felt as long-dead NIN news websites started to fill with details about The Fragile. I was a sophomore in college. I devoured everything I could about the upcoming release. When it arrived, I was not disappointed. I traveled around to experience The Fragility Tour a few times and the DVD of that tour is one of my favorite videos to watch and share with others. I get so excited about NIN it often annoys the people who have to listen to me. It's been a huge part of my life.

That said, the last disc felt thrown together and the show I attended in Fresno felt like band rehearsal. To be fair, it was a sort of rehearsal for the upcoming tour. There is just something about the new music and Trent's recent stage presence that, to me, does not feel genuine. Maybe it's because I'm all grown up now and I just don't feel the way I did when I was younger. I really internalized things at that age, and now my focus is more broad. Or maybe the creative spark I connected with is no longer present in Trent's work. I try not to think about it, because it can be very disappointing.

I have mixed feelings about the upcoming release and all that surrounds it. If I was a teenager again, would I be engrossed? I really don't know. I have a hard time getting interested; I just want to hear the music. And I want it to be amazing again.

If one takes an alternate view of the "marketing campaign" as an performance art piece, the whole concept becomes more clear. Mr. Reznor is presenting what he imagines the future to be if our society stays on its present course. This of course, could be accomplished via heavy handed lyrics in his new album. Presenting the world of Year Zero in a mixed media format, with an accompanying album, allows his point to be made more elegantly.

Trent Reznor has a history as not only a musician. Any fan of NIN knows of the existence of the "Broken" video. The ~30 minute video (with extremely disturbing, certianly non MTV friendly, content) that accompanies the Broken album was never released officially, but helps flesh out the narrative of the album.

I believe Salon has published an article which asked, "Where are the protest albums?" Year Zero, in my opinion, is the first protest album to come out of the Bush II/911/Iraq II political era. I encourage everyone to actually visit the Year Zero websites and discover for themselves what Mr. Reznor is trying to convey with his new, mixed media, are piece.

"...It's hard to imagine anyone who's not a fan of Reznor's pummeling electronic beats and pitch-black worldview being moved to buy the album because of a clever marketing campaign...."

I'm apparently the exception to your stated rule. I certainly couldn't have been called a "fan" per se. I knew some of NIN's songs from the radio, and appreciated those "beats and pitch-black worldview" when I heard them, even head banged / sang along with a few, and I always think highly of any artist that can and does handle ALL the chores involved (playing, singing, etc.), but hadn't ever felt compelled to buy a NIN CD.

I do now.

I wandered across the mythology during a little free-associative web browsing 2 weeks ago, and out of curiosity, followed all the links. The story is compelling, and compellingly presented. It's actually chilling in many ways. It's a future I can actually sense being a possible reality. Sheeple everywhere, "Sure, you can take my constitutional rights away in the name of anti-terrorism", "Put anti-chemical warfare drugs into the water supply? What a GREAT idea! In the name of fighting terrorism of course.", and the classic, "If I haven't done anything wrong, or haven't a guilty conscience, then I needn't be worried about my rights being misused against me..." I had lingering uneasiness just from following the links, and reading the (Very realistically presented) storyline, and not a few mini-nightmares, and I'm not usually susceptible to that sort of thing.

If taking the cynical view, I suppose all the deciphering can be attributed to over-zealous, OCD type fans... But... It tickles me that someone (or someones') actually sat down and built this myth/storyline, and even assumed someone, somewhere, would think to take a spectrographic analysis of a random sound. How COOL is that assumption? How much faith in your fans does that take?

I have no idea if that concentrated a dose of that much doom and gloom and pitch-black worldview will suit me musically. Doesn't matter. Creativity deserves reward, and I LOVE creativity.

kim