By Bill Slawski, on March 9, 2007, at 12:16 amThe web opens up some wonderful opportunities for marketing in new ways, and one of the more innovative approaches that I’ve seen lately is from Trent Reznor’s band Nine Inch Nails.
A discovery from fans that a concert t-shirt had bolded letters in a message on its back that spelled out a domain name began an increasingly mysterious journey. The website attached to the name paints a portrait of a dystopian future. It also provides an introduction to an online world that I’m looking forward to experiencing.
Rolling Stone Magazine writes about these pages from the band Nine Inch Nails, in “Year Zero” Project = Way Cooler Than “Lost”.
I’m not sure their article really begins to show how much the band has captured the imagination of the public. The Nine Inch Nails forum thread on the Year Zero project is now at 397 pages. Scroll down to “THIS IS WHAT IS GOING ON” on the front page of the thread to begin.
[...] Bill Slawski did one of my favorite blog posts this week. He pointed to a Rolling Stone article that discusses how Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails fame is leading several people on a merry web chase to uncover websites from a bleak, dystopian future. [...]
[...] Trent Reznor and Peter Murphy have both long been linked as Trent credits Peter for breaking him into radio (see end of Youtube video below). Matt Cutts pointed out some of NIN’s best practices pointing to Bill Slawski’s post on Indsutrial Music Marketing. I’ll add another example. Last year, Trent and Peter toured together and did some pre-show perfomances together in various places. They were on a page where you could download them. Due to that they are now on Youtube. I post Trent singing the Bauhaus classic “Bela Lugosis Dead” and Peter Murphy’s “Strange Kind of Love” for your enjoyment. These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]
[...] I wrote a couple of days ago (Industrial Music Marketing) about how the band Nine Inch Nails had created a mysterious and thoughtful set of web sites to go with a new album that hasn’t been released yet. [...]
[...] SEO by the SEA pointed out a great use of viral marketing by none other than Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails. It’s actually pretty damned cool… but I couldn’t help from asking myself if they had done the same marketing campaign when I was a kid (I listened to them in middle school and high school) would I have enjoyed it? I think my answer is NO. I would have felt cheap for falling into their marketing trap. Meh… but now that I am older, I love it for its creative and effectiveness. [...]
I really enjoyed this link into the increasingly mysterious journey of a dystopian future. Really that’s what Nine Inch Nails is all about though, right? Being different and mysterious. I enjoyed the link because I thought the web site was incredible and that they did an awesome job portraying everything that they were aiming for. It’s not often that you get a designer together with a band and actually create a web site that reflects the band in any way, shape or form. You’re definitely right about NIN capturing the imaginations of the public. They have certainly done that from day one. Although, I wonder why this and why now? They have already had so much fame. What was the point of doing this? Were they sick of all the Kevin Bacon and Six Degrees hype and wanted to get the focus back on rock and stuff? Or was it just a project they wanted to play with?
I’d guess that it has given them the chance to create something interesting and unique in a different medium, that enhances what listeners experience.
The sites, the tshirts, and the other things that they did in the physical world; these all show that you can have fun, and do something newsworthy and interesting that people might consider fun and interesting instead of marketing hype. I love that what NIN has done involves people interacting with the band, and with the vision of a world that they have created.