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Saul Williams - The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of Niggy Tardust

Essential Dazzler

11:28 / 26.10.07

I've been anticipating this album for months, but I was completely blindsided by the announcement that this album will be following Radiohead's new download honor system.

over at www.niggytardust.com you can chose between three different file formats, all with included artwork pdfs, for $5 or diddly.

The album is written and performed by Saul, but produced entirely by Trent Reznor, of Nine Inch Nails. I for one am extremely pleased about this, the first time I encountered Saul was in his support slot of NIN's European With Teeth tour. I think Trent's most recent work has, both lyrically and sonically, shown great potential to mesh really well with Saul's music. Also, all of the direct collaborations between the two I've heard so far have been phenomonal.

But While I'm fairly certain most of the 'Lith wouldn't mind admiting to an unhelathy desire to be Saul William's friend and confidant, I understand Trent Reznor to be a more divisive prospect.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

16:59 / 26.10.07

Hey, I'm a fan of both (OK, I admit it, I'm an enormous NIN fan, and like you first heard of Mr Williams when he was bloody good as support act), and am REALLY glad you posted this, as I wouldn't have known about it otherwise.

And as far as production goes, I doubt even the most ardent NIN-hater could claim Mr Reznor doesn't know his way round a studio.

Essential Dazzler

18:50 / 28.10.07

Apparently this album is including a lot of material salvaged from the recording sessions of The Fragile. I haven't heard it yet (because I can't use bittorrent), but Break, the song that leaked over the weekend, uses a reworking of Even Deeper.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

21:29 / 28.10.07

...oooh... when my credit card bill clears I'll be there.

Essential Dazzler

17:38 / 29.10.07

I've heard both the tracks Reznor leaked now. The first one, Break, sounded pretty much exactly how I was expecting the album to sound, it alternates between the more ambient NIN beats, with some synthy warbling and a gigantic crash of guitars for the chorus. Just as on Tori Amos's Past the Mission, and El-P's Flyentology, Reznor's voice sounds Fantastic as a backing vocal.

Tr(n)igger, conversely, surprised the hell out of me. It sounded a lot like what little I've heard of NWA.

Both very good tracks, but Break is much more to my liking, it's going to be interesting to see which style takes precedence on the album, or if any others emerge.

Essential Dazzler

23:52 / 31.10.07

Do I not sleep at all tonight, or set an alarm for 5 a.m?

Completly torn.

Jack Fear

22:32 / 02.11.07

Oh, fuck me. Does the world really need a cover of U2's "Sunday Bloody Sunday," especially one this depressingly faithful—right down to sampling the drum part from the original, and then not doing anything interesting with it?

I dunno, guys. I've liked the odd SW track in the past, but this... if this is supposed to be selling me the album, then I ain't buying. I'm just not feelin' it.

totep

18:29 / 03.11.07

This album is fucking amazing. Saul Williams is a musical genius and I appreciate the way he keeps growing as both a musician and lyricist. Brilliant stuff.

The Return Of Rothkoid

04:58 / 08.11.07

Fuck it. I've paid my fiver (that's what happens when the Oz $ is almost equal to the US) and I'm downloading FLAC now. Even if the disc ain't all that and a bag of chips (and given his previous work, I can't see it falling that way) I think it's a great move. And hell, it's worth it to support the guy, methinks...

kidninjah

14:56 / 08.11.07

Thanks for pointing this out to us Pacific!

I've casually followed Williams' work for a while, but he'd dropped off my radar recently. It's interesting tho' that this comes out in the week I was thinking of sending you one of his tracks for the Barbi-mix :-)

It usually takes me 100 listens to get into the lyrics of any record, but I love his delivery. "DNA", on his myspace site was hot enough to earn my $5 for the rest of the LP.

Personally, I love the "pay what u like" principle, but I can't succinctly express why, so I'll gather my thoughts for another post on the topic later.

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