This is it. A slightly disturbing percentage of my posts in tha last months are about Nine Inch Nails and Trent Reznor. But that's only because it's pretty important.

So the go to www.nin.com on may 5 suggestion was not about the new site. It was in fact the release date for a new album The Slip.

Year Zero was released on April 16th 2007. Prior to that it was not uncommon for a span of many (5+) years between major studio albums. This time just under 13 months. And if you count Ghosts I-VI (all instrumental) only 2 months. I'm sure a large part of that is the fact that NIN and Trent Reznor are no longer tied to any label. The first released single from The Slip was released online and to radio within 24 hours of it being mastered.

Tech Dirt has a quick write up on the model that The Slip has been released with. Trent Reznor will cut the path that the rest of the music industry will follow in the future. I have no doubt of that.

As far as the album it's self goes. While the style may be far from the days of The Downward Spiral, I really like it. It’s built with very thick and heavy industrial dance beats, making a couple of great radio songs. The album as a whole, track, by track, fades into more experimental, and thus interesting stuff later. It absolutely brings back the overall form of the album as a whole, as something more that just a collection of random singles. Which I love.

Grab a copy yourself, it's completely free.

Another first for Nine Inch Nails, or any band for that matter. They released a new single to radio stations across the country 2 days ago. The incredible part of that is how it had only been mastered less than 24 hours before.

The new single is called Discipline. Never heard on any album before, it's making a little buzz, along with a cryptic comment 2 weeks". The comment in the meta data of the official mp3, says Go to www.nin.com may 5. Most likely that will be that date of the site's newest re-launch. Trent said it was in the works several weeks ago.

Download

The song itself is an example of what I have come to think of as "NIN Pop". Beat heavy tunes, danceable in a way. Frankly I prefer the more experimental rock style of his older stuff. But Discipline is very good in it's own right.

A few months ago Trent Reznor announced that he was free from any Record Label. Immediately people started speculating about what his next move was going to be. The good news is we didn't have to wait very long. Today he released a new album. Ghosts I-IV is a 36 track instrumental album. It's released under a Creative Commons License. Free to copy, remix, and redistribute. So long as your non-commercial.

It's available in 5 flavors. Free download of the first 9 tracks. $5 download of the whole thing, in lossless quality. $10 2xCD. $75 2xCD, 1xDVD w/multitrack recordings for remixing, 1xBlu-ray True-HD surround sound version. And finally a $300 limited edition signed by Reznor, including 2xCD, 1xDVD, 1xBlu-ray, 4xVinyl, And a partridge in a pear tree.

I have been trying to get my download that came with the $10 2xCD set, but the server has been hammered. So I turned to Bittorrent. The CC license makes that completely legal. However the flash player on the site is working, and so far I'm reasonably pleased. I can't wait to hear the whole thing.

Yep the album surrounded by lots of story and controversy regarding Leaked songs is here. And it is serous. I'm typing as I'm listening. I haven't even made it to the end yet, and I know it is the album I have been waiting for. Absolutely Reznor's best since The Downward Spiral. I have bought every album since, and the whole time I was waiting. None of them seemed to measure up. I'm not saying the others were bad, they weren't at all. But now I feel vindicated Nine Inch Nails I remember is back. If you ever bought a NIN album, don't hesitate, go buy this one.