Zero-Sum
Written By: jonny.gotham
Date: December 10, 2009
Comments: 0
Nine Inch Nails is known for a louder, harder–hitting sound, but I find Reznor’s ballads to be just as evocative, if not more. From the album Year Zero, “Zero–Sum” has a great ghostly piano part paired with strong lyrics that just seem to just pull at your thoughts, memories, and emotions. The song plays like fuzzy old memoir recording, but it works just the same. You can just imagine feeling a bit stranded, and this track playing on a loop after things have seemingly gone all wrong. It’s been stuck in my head for over a month now, so I thought I might share the song and lyrics with you… I hope you enjoy it.
Related Topics: Anthropology, Life, Music
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- The Burn Lines of of Memory and Truth
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Truth arrives with a violent, fiery light
Burning memories to ember, then ash, without mercy in sight.
Guard loving recollections with your body and soul,
But you too will vanish and erase as a whole.Date: May 31, 2009, Written By: g.h. Ost
- And All That Could Have Been
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With my recent fervor surrounding Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails (NIN), I thought I would give a retrospective on how I became exposed to NIN, and the drive behind my recent consumption and study of any materials related to Reznor’s work and philosophy on music. Whether you enjoy the music of NIN or not, it’s difficult to argue Reznor’s brilliance as an artist and pioneer — the intelligence behind it is at times, astounding.
Date: May 27, 2009, Written By: jonny.gotham
- Truths Before I Told You
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What if I told you the truth, instead of lies?
My flaws, my weaknesses without the alibis.
Would you accept me for who I am or subtly cast me out
Tell me your own version of excuses and reflect upon doubt.Date: May 10, 2009, Written By: g.h. Ost
- Saul Bass
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Saul Bass was an influential graphic designer, and to a lesser–known degree, filmmaker, whose work extended from 1950’s up through the 90’s. While I won’t attempt to recapture his life and achievements here (as it could never do it justice), I can tell you about my own experience when I came across Bass’s work, and the fascination that ensued.
Date: May 01, 2009, Written By: jonny.gotham
Film & Television
- 500 Days of Summer
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Love hurts. Not being loved… well, that hurts even more.
- Moon
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While Jones is new to feature films, he handles the job masterfully while Sam Rockwell completes the puzzle in this seemingly one–man show.
- Angels and Demons
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Angels and Demons is the follow–up to Dan Brown’s epic The Da Vinci Code, at least as far as movies go. In literary history, Angels and Demons takes place and was written before The Da Vinci Code, and while the latter takes on religion in France, the former takes place in Vatican City. Though The Da Vinci Code was still a box–office success despite its many problems (critics were definitely mixed on the film), I believe the film rode on the books gargantuan success. In coming weeks, we will see if its counterpart can do the same.
- Star Trek
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Excellent. Just really, really excellent.
Sites & Web Articles
- James Jean
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James Jean is an amazing painter based out of Los Angeles, California. His style blends the paint strokes of ancient Asian artwork (typically found on scrolls) with ghost–like detail, giving an end result that can best be described as “hauntingly beautiful”.
- Aaron Scamihorn
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Aaron Scamihorn is an artist that’s also an iconographer, typographer, and photographer. That’s a lot of [–ographer]’s, whew!
- Op Zoek Naar Maria
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This has to be one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a while. While I’ve always been a big fan of the Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The Sound of Music, this is just really, really awesome. While there have been similar public acts by Improv Everywhere (the Grand Central Station Mission), Op Zoek Naar Maria’s (In Search of Maria) execution for puts them to shame. The site is in Dutch, but the video really shows you everything. Het Verbazen.
- cutmovie.co.uk
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Women's Aid is an organization in the U.K. aimed at ending domestic abuse and violence against women and children. In their latest campaign, cutmovie.co.uk, actor Keira Knightley "stars" in the very effective short.
Books & Literature
- The Stranger
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"Maman died today. Or yesterday, maybe, I don’t know." So starts Albert Camus’s story of the absurd. If I could really describe this book, I honestly would, however it’s existential nature makes it quite difficult to really pin it down. Briefly described, The Stranger is a story of Meursault, a man caught up in a senseless murder, and the progression and details of his experience in the absurdity and meaningless nature of human existence.
- The Sun Also Rises
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"One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth forever… The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to the place where he arose… The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to its circuits… All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come thither they return again." - Ecclesiastes 1:5
- House and Philosophy
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House and Philosophy
- The Yiddish Policeman’s Union
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Another book by Michael Chabon, this detective story is set in an alternate history during which, in World War II, a temporary township is established in Sitka, Alaska to accept Jewish refugees, with the State of Israel being destroyed in 1948. Following Detective Meyer Landsman, the tale brings the reader through a classic whodunnit story investigating the murder of a man called Emmanuel Lasker during the last weeks of his official employ by Sitka Police before reversion to American control.
Music
- Frank Turner: Love Ire & Song
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“You'll live to dance another day, it's just now you'll have to dance, for the two of us”
- J Dilla: Donuts
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If you think of hip–hop producers, every legend is going to name a legend of their own starting up, and I’m going to bet James Yancy, a.k.a. Jay Dee, a.k.a. J Dilla, will be dropped a number of times. Seeing something a while back about the evolution of hip–hop, I think it was Busta that said it best, “You go out there and ask any hip–hop producer in the game who their favorite producer is, and they’re gonna tell you J Dilla. He was a producer’s producer.” That was the first time I ever heard Dilla referenced like that, but it definitely wouldn’t be my last.
- Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D
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Part two of Nine Inch Nails’s Year Zero Project comes as a remix album, Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D.
- Year Zero
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So I’ve recently had a revival of listening to the ever prodigious Nine Inch Nails, and decided to back-track a bit to the last two albums Trent Reznor released before leaving both Interscope Records and the standard infrastructure for the music industry behind.