On December 23, Nine Inch Nails will self-release Not The Actual Events, a new five- song EP. It finds Reznor and now official bandmate Atticus Ross taking an unexpected left turn from 2013’s Hesitation Marks and sounding unrecognizable from their current film work. “It’s an unfriendly, fairly impenetrable record that we needed to make,” says Reznor. “It’s an EP because that ended up being the proper length to tell that story.”
A very special limited vinyl edition of The Fragile is also available for pre-order in the NIN store. Created by Reznor and Ross, this four-disc, 150-minute version of the classic 1999 album features 37 instrumental, alternate and unreleased tracks, many of which have never been heard before. The Fragile: Deviations 1 will not be available on any digital services.
“The Fragile occupies a very interesting and intimate place in my heart,” explains Reznor. “I was going through a turbulent time in my life when making it and revisiting it has become a form of therapy for me. As an experiment, I removed all the vocals from the record and found it became a truly changed experience that worked on a different yet compelling level. The Fragile: Deviations 1 represents Atticus and I embellishing the original record with a number of tracks from those sessions we didn’t use before. The result paints a complimentary but different picture we wanted to share.”
Reznor and NIN art director John Crawford have begun the meticulous process of creating “definitive editions” of all the major NIN releases on vinyl. Fans can now pre-order the first three Definitive Editions (Broken, The Downward Spiral and The Fragile) in the NIN store. They will receive a digital download of the remastered audio shortly and vinyl will ship in spring 2017. Those interested in obtaining upcoming reissues, which will be released later in 2017, can request to be notified when specific albums become available.
“We want to present the catalog as it was intended to be, with no compromises,” says Reznor. “That means a careful remastering of the audio from the original sources, a painstaking recreation of the artwork, pristine materials, some surprises and an insane attention to detail that you probably won’t notice…but it matters to us. No extra bullshit and gimmicks – the ‘real’ records in their truest form.”
Photo Credit: John Crawford
