Trent, Popular Music, and the Avant-Garde
by michael heumann
The term "avant-garde" is at once an artistic and a political term. It is artistic in that it suggests innovation, the desire to throw away preconceptions of art and remake them according to new standards and attitudes. It is political because, whether you realize it or not, art shapes society's beliefs, attitudes, and aspirations; consequently, to remake art, one must necessarily challenge the very fabric of a culture. In many ways, popular music is all about challenging or attacking mainstream culture. By and large, however, rock and roll is not seen as "avant-garde" primarily because the whole concept behind it (namely, popularity or record sales) is firmly entrenched in the very mainstream music industry which "avant-garde" music is supposed to be fighting against.
In other words, the question of avant-garde and popular music takes us to the great question of 20th-century revolutionary politics: How can real, substantial change take place in a world run by mass media? It is the sheer perplexity of this question which has led me to become so interested in Nine Inch Nails. Although emerging from the avant-garde industrial scene that opposed the mainstream music industry, it did not take very long for the band, and particularly Trent Reznor, to establish itself as key figures within the same mainstream its music was (supposedly) fighting against. What is the result of such an odd turn of events? What do we make of NIN's music and its relation to the history of popular and experimental music in the 20th century? In the following overview of NINfluences, I attempt to answer some of these questions by focusing specifically upon the musical lineage which NIN has followed and what this lineage might say about NIN's own ambiguous position in the music industry.
For the most part, NIN's musical themes are pretty conventional rock and roll stuff. Pain, anger, self-loathing, isolation, fear, invasions of one's space or one's body, death resulting from all of the above, and a certain hope for a transcendence or cathartic expulsion of morbidity from one's body. All this has been done before, of course -- which is not to say NIN's approach isn't interesting or even unique in many ways, but to recognize that they are linked in many ways to a long tradition of rock and roll rebellion that goes back to the early blues artists of the '20s and '30s like Charley Patton, Robert Johnson, and (later) Howlin' Wolf, and is entirely grounded in the early rock of Elvis Presley and Little Richard. However, the rebellious music of the mid-50s was largely driven by the sounds and beats of the music and the exuberance of the performers, which meant that rebellion was masked behind songs that were fun to dance to and sing along with. This meant that, although Elvis sang a bunch of love songs written by other people, what his music represented was as anti-authoritarian and as rebellious as NIN's songs of death and pain.
Directly confrontational music (both lyrically and musically) didn't really get going until the late 1960s and early-to-mid '70s. Although the emphasis upon anti-authoritarian attitudes and lyrics got started with bands such as The Rolling Stones, The Who, and The Doors, they were really just the prelude to more experimental and avant-garde artists like The Velvet Underground, The Stooges, David Bowie, and Pink Floyd.
VU's music should be familiar to everyone interested in "alternative" (or whatever it's called) music, since they basically invented the concept (quite literally -- before VU, music that wasn't a hit was generally dismissed by critics and fans alike; nowadays, a commercially unsuccessful record is quite often praised by critics for just that fact). If you aren't yet into them, their new boxed set, Peel Slowly and See, contains everything they ever recorded (except the live stuff), but is a bit pricey; otherwise get The Velvet Underground and Nico, which has "Heroin," "Venus in Furs," and "The Black Angel's Death Song" -- three songs that basically sum up punk rock and a lot of industrial as well. In fact, all three could easily fit on PHM or TDS.
The Stooges were a Detroit band that made really loud, really annoying, and really scary music, again influencing punk. They were the NIN of their time, and you can really hear how scary it is on Fun House, especially the song "LA Blues," which sounds a lot like Broken except there's a saxophone instead of a keyboard buried under the noise. Iggy Pop's screaming vocals, plus his in-your-face performance style, became a sort of template for punk and hardcore bands in the '70s and '80s, and Reznor's own stage presence (throwing stuff around, hitting keyboards, using the microphone as a whip) can be traced back to the Ig.
Bowie, whose recent tour with NIN should explain his inclusion in this overview, should be interesting to NIN fans because of his theatrical presentation -- his creation of characters that came to life both on record and on stage. His The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars is a great example of this. Lots of the NIN themes are there -- isolation, loneliness, pain, fear, and anger, all built around a story of an alien who comes to earth and becomes a pop star (or something like that -- who really knows what the hell is going on in this thing?). This album would certainly be a good place to go if you liked TDS, but even better is Low, the album he and Brian Eno made in Berlin in 1977, amidst the punk explosion. The keyboard work and the eerily icy sounds, echoes, and vocals really set the stage for the industrial scene. It's a great example of how experimental music can merge with mainstream pop styles (vocals, song structure, and instrumentation) to really instigate a transformation of the way people thought about music. I think this is why Reznor cites Low as a primary influence on his own work.
Another album Reznor often cited as influential to his own work is Pink Floyd's The Wall. EVERY theme NIN has ever tackled, from lust to alienation to the boredom and craziness of stardom, can be found in this album. To be quite honest, however, I am frankly bored by the record -- 20 years later, it doesn't seem to hold up for me as well as punk (which emerged at about the same time). Nevertheless, its importance in Reznor's life and his art cannot be overestimated, particularly in terms of narrative structure -- telling a story of the destruction of a human body across the course of an album -- and its ability to meld each song into the next, creating a seamless whole.
Another strand of rebellion that is important to NIN is the shock or titillation music of Alice Cooper, KISS, and like-minded bands that wore makeup, ate rats on stage, and did other things to scare the hell out of parents. Reznor's decision to produce and support Marilyn Manson is a good indication of his love and respect for this genre, and suggests that he understands and appreciates music for the most basic reason -- sheer titillation. What stands out in Cooper and KISS, of course, is the cartoonishness of the violence and sex and power -- something that is today called "postmodern" because it is aware of its own stupidity, but at the time was either eaten up by kids like Trent or abhorred by parents and other authority figures (that is, the same people who couldn't recognize the irony in "Big Man With a Gun"). On some level, NIN's music is always Alice Cooper-ish, which is to say it plays with excesses and shock tactics for the hell of it. What makes NIN so much more interesting, however, is that their music doesn't stop at this level, but builds upon it, adding political, social, and psychical context that could never find their way into KISS Alive!.
It is certainly true that NIN is known first and foremost as a synth band (albeit much harder and louder than most). But Reznor's ability to incorporate traditional rock guitar into industrial or electronic music is central to NIN's success and their sound. Thus, to fully appreciate NIN's musical influences, you have to not only understand where he got his synthesizer ideas, but how he made them rock. To do this, we need to examine several different areas of avant-garde and popular music. The first is electronic music, the second is punk, and the third is industrial.
While electronic music is primarily associated with synthesizers or weird computer noises, the actual history behind the music is much more complex and more interesting than that. It really began around 1915 in Italy when a guy named Luigi Russolo, who was associated with the Futurist art movement, wrote a manifesto called "The Art of Noises." In it, he declared that music as it had been defined was dead; in its place would arise the sounds, noises, and voices of modern and mechanical life. His early experiments with this "noise music" would be performed upon strange instruments with names like howlers, boomers, cracklers, scrapers, gurglers, and whistles. It was music that reflected the slogan that Monte Cazzaza, in 1975, would term "industrial music for industrial people." Music for people who live and breathe in toxic air, who are secondary in importance to automobiles, who rarely (if ever) can experience a moment of absolute silence. We live with noise, and in order to develop beyond the 19th century, Russolo and his antecedents realized that we must begin to create music that reflects our situation.
Many others across the 20th century (even some who had never heard of Russolo) found themselves tracing similar lines of thought in their own musical expeditions. Some of these, like Edgar Varese and the industrial artists, were interested less in the idea of reshaping music than in tearing the concept apart, obliterating it and all other bourgeois concepts along with it. Most, however, really wanted to experiment with the possibilities brought about by the liberation of music from traditional mediums like opera houses, orchestras, etc. Perhaps the most prominent of these composers is John Cage, who is to music what Joyce is to literature or Picasso is to art -- namely, the guy who rewrote all the rules, thereby forcing everyone else to follow suit. Cage did almost everything, including work with tape recorders -- which was a big change in the concept of recording music, because with this machine composers did not have to rely upon real-time performances but could create performances out of old ones by splicing them together. Cartridge Music and Fontana Mix are two excellent examples of the work he created with this instrument; the best bet, and easiest to obtain, however, is The 25-Year Retrospective Concert of the Music of John Cage, which gives a nice, substantial overview of his life and works.
While Cage's experimentations are monumental in the history of music, the most famous electronic composition is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gersang der Junglinge, a work that is brilliant because it accomplishes the remarkable feat of incorporating noise (as Russolo defined it) with the angelic cries of singing children, thereby revealing manifestly the musicality of modern life in a way modern-thinking bands (including and perhaps especially NIN) only dream about.
In the world of pop music, electronic instrumentation really got started in the early 1970s with the works of German bands like Kraftwerk and Can and composers like Brian Eno (founding member of Roxy Music). Eno's work, in particular, managed to bring Cage's notions of music as a function of everyday life into the realm of pop by developing a style that is now called ambient or "new age." His '70s albums Another Green World, Discreet Music, and Before and After Science established Eno as one of the most interesting and influential artists anywhere. This influence has been borrowed by many, and Eno is also one of the most significant producers in pop music, with the likes of Talking Heads, U2, David Bowie, and others serving under his mentorship. Although NIN's music is generally harder and more laden with distortion than Eno's work, Reznor still owes a great deal to this artist. Check out the latter half of TDS and compare it to Green World -- notice the interesting things going on in the background of each? For many, Eno created background music, and Reznor clearly picks up on this in his softer songs (not to mention the "pop songs" like "Closer" that use these sounds to create tension).
There have been so many synthesizer bands that it's hard to know who to mention and who to leave out. Actually, it's probably quite easy to leave most of them out. But a few warrant notice, because their music is not only influential to NIN, but to all pop music. Perhaps the best and earliest pioneers in synthetic music were Kraftwerk, whose albums Radio Active, Trans-Europe Express, and The Man Machine redefined musical styles from punk to hip hop (most of the early rap DJs cite Kraftwerk as a major influence on their own work). The German band was initially seen as a novelty act, but in fact their music holds up remarkably well 20 years later, due principally to the simple fact that everyone since then has copied or at least borrowed from them. In fact, I see no reason to elaborate further on the numerous bands in the '80s and '90s that have followed Kraftwerk into the computer. Techno, trance, jungle, industrial, rage, acid, and all the other billions of dance and soundscape genres all owe at least a nod to the Krauts.
Punk rock began at about the same time as industrial (1975-79), and was in many ways the antithesis to many of the musical styles I've heretofore mentioned. Punk, like industrial music, however, is fundamentally political, in that it was made by people who openly critiqued and sought to change the music industry. Despite the similarities, punk and industrial are distinctly different in one respect -- musical style. More people are familiar with punk because, unlike industrial or electronic music, it is grounded in the same song structure (verse-chorus-verse), arrangement (guitar, drums, vocals), and performance concepts as most pop music. This means that it is easier for a punk band like Nirvana to become popular than, say, Coil. Of course, what the early punks did with this medium is altogether different from, say, The Rolling Stones or Pink Floyd or other more established bands, but the basics are still the same.
I don't think I need to say much about punk because so many before me (Greil Marcus and Jon Savage, to name but two) have already done it. Of course, I couldn't give an accurate picture of punk without mentioning The Ramones, The Sex Pistols, and The Clash; by all means check their stuff out if you haven't already. However, for the true-blue NIN fan, I'd recommend a few lesser-known works. First, Television's Marquee Moon, because it touches on many of the same themes as NIN and does so in a similarly lyrical fashion; second and third, get Wire's Pink Flag and Gang of Four's Entertainment, two incredibly sophisticated works (both lyrically and musically) that offer pointed political commentaries on the role of entertainment in contemporary life. "The business of pleasure / What to do for leisure" is my motto, and is something to keep in mind as you listen to NIN. Some other great punk music includes bands like X-Ray Spex, The Raincoats, The Slits, The Buzzcocks, along with American counterparts like X, Black Flag, Sonic Youth, The Minutemen, Husker Du, and The Replacements. All work off the same basic themes as the early bands, but broaden the sounds and the topics to which the music refers. All are direct influences on the "grunge" or '90s punk scene, which (among other things) paved the way for NIN's success by providing a space for experimental and "alternative" music to flourish in the pop mainstream.
The topic of punk was always confrontation and open assault on the music industry. That's why so many of the early punk bands worked through independent distributors or started their own record companies. This was also the case with the earliest industrial bands, in particular Throbbing Gristle, who coined the term and provided the framework for the music that followed. The whole purpose behind TG was basically to expose the corruption and false idolatry of the music industry -- and, beyond that, culture in general. By rejecting traditional musical instruments, all notions of musical structure, by embracing machines, factories, dirt and grime, they sought to expose the "hidden" parts of society, exploit them, and force their ugliness into the open for all to see. To a large degree, their plan worked, as they caused scandals in the United States and Britain, performing sets comprised solely of white noise, directly confronting their audiences and forcing them to react physically (not just intellectually) to the music they were experiencing -- they brought a whole new concept of music and performance into the popular arena. Other artists of that era that are worth a listen are SPK, NON, and Cabaret Voltaire. Later bands, especially Einstürzende Neubauten from Germany, went even farther by ignoring all traditional instruments and making real "noise" music by using trash cans, drills, and other "found" objects.
Industrial today is really a lot of different types of music that share only their opposition to the mainstream music industry. The music itself varies from an offshoot of traditional industrial (Ministry, Skinny Puppy, Coil), to rap and hip hop (Meat Beat Manifesto, Consolidated, and The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy), techno (Moby, Goldie, Massive Attack), jungle (Tricky), ambient (Orbital, Aphex Twin, Kenny Larkin), and even disco (KMFDM, My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult). While NIN shares a camaraderie with many of these artists, the group differs in one important respect -- namely, that their music is much more popular (both in musical terms and in terms of record sales) than other industrial bands. There are several reasons for this. One is his willingness to use conventional song structure and instrumentation -- that is, his songs incorporate traditional instruments like drums, guitars, and expressive vocals along with computer generated sounds. Another is Reznor's own willingness to act as the center of the group's image -- to write painful songs in the first person, thereby positioning himself as the locus through which the audience reads and understands the music. This, along with the incredible concerts and equally remarkable videos, has made Reznor a sex symbol -- an image to be consumed by the media and fetishized by fans.
Of course, many in the industrial scene see NIN as a sellout. Indeed, the general interpretation of "avant-garde" would support this reading. However, to follow this logic to its limit, avant-garde artists must never sell a single record or have any fans. Of course, this is an exaggeration, but it serves to point out a significant fact -- no artist working in music can be "avant-garde" no matter what their intentions are, because the musical industry is set up so that one must buy into it to a certain degree in order for people to hear your music.
This is why I find the idea that NIN are sellouts to be complete crap. If, in order to get your message across you have to occupy a position within popular culture, the only way to accomplish your goal is to manipulate the media that provide success. That's what NIN has done so successfully. They have not forsaken industrial, they have found a way to push the industrial message into the mainstream. Think of the choruses of NIN's two most familiar songs: "head like a hole / black as your soul / i'd rather die / than give you control" and "i want to fuck you like an animal." This ain't no Whitney Houston, is it? No, it's a message that few would be willing to listen to if it weren't so damn catchy. In the same way that Dr. Dre, Snoop Doggy Dogg, and Wu Tang Clan are seen as threats to middle class American, Reznor and NIN represent a threat to "decency" and "morality" by provoking audiences, forcing their fans to think about the images and messages which they contain, and (most of all) question the very foundations that support and maintain our system.
NIN is not generally seen as a political band (like U2 or Public Enemy) because their songs contain no direct messages like "Fuck tha' Police" or "Sunday Bloody Sunday." Rather, NIN's music creates images of decay and destruction, evokes emotions of fear and alienation, and generally scares many who don't understand or can't take the noise. NIN forces its audience to recognize and understand the very pain that all of us experience on a daily basis. To me, this is more gripping, more disturbing, more radical than almost any other musical statement. That's why I think the greatest effect of NIN's music will be to inspire others to be just as annoying, controversial, and radical as Trent. May we all keep this lesson in mind.
For More Information:
Michael Heumann (aboo@primenet.com) is a Ph.D.
candidate in English at the University of California-Riverside and
creator of Acoustic
Disturbance: The Online Dissertation Project, an examination
of the link between sound, technology, and fascism in 20th-century
culture. His Acoustic Disturbance paper Entertainment Through Pain:
Sexual Chaos and Industrial Terror in the Music of Trent Reznor,
which he delivered at the Drake University Conference on Popular Music
in March 1996, appeared in Hope
and Vaseline #4.
