Nine Inch Nails - Just like you imagined (Live AATCHB)

[@grdyk]

One of the best tracks ever.

[@jimmorrison9287]

That whole album is a masterpiece.

[@koyaaanisquatsi]

1:32 Charlie Clouser is seen playing Theremin in this track. Here is what Charlie said on Reddit AMA: "Well, TR and all of us owe a huge debt and lots of love to Bob Moog, and were lucky enough to know him and call him a friend and enthusiastic supporter. So we had absolutely every piece of gear he ever made, which of course included a few of his EtherWave Theremins. While I can't definitively say whether or not one got used on The Fragile album, when we were prepping for the tour and figuring out how to render those songs live, TR said, "Chumpy, you've got less than nothing to do on this song, so instead of just standing on your riser looking like a dork, break out a Theremin and see if you can make a sound that doesn't suck ass." Now the Theremin is basically impossible to play. You have to stand absolutely still and have it mounted very securely, otherwise just the thing wiggling on it's stand will be enough to mess up your pitch. I knew this would look lame on stage, so something had to be done. What inspired me then (and still does) is Jimmy Page's epic Theremin tomfoolery on Led Zeppelin's The Song Remains The Same live album and film. I'm a huge Zeppelin fan (fuck the h8ers), and seeing that movie for the first time in high school I was like, "WHAT THE HELL IS HE DOING TO MAKE THOSE EPIC PSYCHO SOUNDS?!?!" So I broke out a Theremin, got my hands on an Antares ATR-1, which is basically a rack-mount hardware unit with Auto-Tune inside. I set it so that it would only allow three or four notes in an octave, notes which would work within the scale of a solo I wanted to play, and set the "grab time" or "glide time" of the unit so it would take it half a second to one second to lock onto the pitch and pull it into tune. This prevented any "stair-stepping" of the pitch like you hear on a Two Chains vocal or whatever, so you could get wild and wiggly pitch sweeps, but once you landed on a pitch it would pull you into tune. Take the clean, dry output of the Theremin right into the ATR-1, and since a Theremin's raw output is basically a single sine or sawtooth wave, the ATR-1 has no problem at all locking onto it, and produces no weird formants or other artifacts on the output. Take the output of the ATR-1 to a TC Electronics FireWorx multi-effects unit for tons of distortion, delay, and reverb, and boom. Wild-n-wiggly Theremin solos that are still in tune with the song. The way the ATR-1 works is you define which of the twelve notes in the octave are "permitted" and which are "not permitted", and then the input is always forced to conform to one of the permitted notes, and that grid repeats across all the octaves so you can play low, you can play high, doesn't matter - the output will always glide to the nearest permitted note in whatever octave you happen to be in. It. Works. Perfectly. Bob Moog came down to a show when we were near Asheville, and I could see his big fluffy white head of hair bobbing up and down at the front of house mix position the whole time, and he'd elbow his companions and point whenever I lit up the Theremin. Afterward the show in the dressing room he was like, "It's amazing you can have such good pitch control on the Theremin even while you're swinging the thing around like that!" and I was like, "Well, sorry to admit this, but I'm using an Auto-Tune unit" and then I described the process. For a second I thought he'd be disappointed that I was "cheating" but he laughed and said, "That's a fantastic idea! And it works perfectly!" Years later, Moog came out with the ThereMini (the white plastic, UFO-looking Theremin) and it has a similar Auto-Tune feature BUILT-IN! So apparently it was a good idea after all. As to how we would replicate unique or weird things from the records, we really had to keep the gear on stage as simple and fool-proof (and waterproof) as possible, so we used samplers for just about everything. Only the keyboard solo that TR plays on "Happiness In Slavery" was triggering the actual synth that made that sound on the record (the Prophet VS) because it had to be a legato+glide type of sound that is difficult or impossible to replicate with a sampler. You can get close, but it's not exact, so we'd bring a real Prophet VS out and it would sit safely offstage while TR played it from the remote keyboard on stage. But everything else (not guitars or drums obv) was coming out of rackmount samplers mounted safely offstage. On the Self Destruct tour these were Emax II units with internal hard drives, on the Fragility tours we upgraded to E-Mu E4 units. All of the keyboards on stage were original (brown) Yamaha DX7 synths, just used as MIDI controllers. There are a zillion DX7's out there and you can find more in any small-town pawn shop or music store, and we did go through a lot of them - smashing an average to two or three per show. But how to replicate tricky sequences etc. on stage using just a keyboard and a sampler? What I'd do sometimes is sample the actual riff from the album multitrack tapes, and then chop it up into little pieces and lay them out on the keyboard. That way, if you play the keys in the right order and with accurate timing, you can replicate just about any weird thing that was on the album. Like the drum machine/bassline thing on Starfuckers - I chopped it into "kick piece" and "snare piece" and just hammered away at the keyboard in time to what Jerome was playing on the live drums. Simpler than it sounds, and it works perfectly."

[@adamblister6005]

Charlie Clouser on that goddamn theremin is the most badass thing I've ever seen!

[@hectorwallace5083]

+Pete Agassi Charlie is actually considered one of the top professional theremin players to date. I just bought one a while back and he makes it look so easy. Then again, I'm not playing live with Nine Inch Nails...

[@ShadyAcacia]

I air theremin during that part

[@h4724-q6j]

@@hectorwallace5083 He recently answered a question about that in an AMA thread on Reddit: "Well, TR and all of us owe a huge debt and lots of love to Bob Moog, and were lucky enough to know him and call him a friend and enthusiastic supporter. So we had absolutely every piece of gear he ever made, which of course included a few of his EtherWave Theremins. While I can't definitively say whether or not one got used on The Fragile album, when we were prepping for the tour and figuring out how to render those songs live, TR said, "Chumpy, you've got less than nothing to do on this song, so instead of just standing on your riser looking like a dork, break out a Theremin and see if you can make a sound that doesn't suck ass." Now the Theremin is basically impossible to play. You have to stand absolutely still and have it mounted very securely, otherwise just the thing wiggling on it's stand will be enough to mess up your pitch. I knew this would look lame on stage, so something had to be done. What inspired me then (and still does) is Jimmy Page's epic Theremin tomfoolery on Led Zeppelin's The Song Remains The Same live album and film. I'm a huge Zeppelin fan (fuck the h8ers), and seeing that movie for the first time in high school I was like, "WHAT THE HELL IS HE DOING TO MAKE THOSE EPIC PSYCHO SOUNDS?!?!" So I broke out a Theremin, got my hands on an Antares ATR-1, which is basically a rack-mount hardware unit with Auto-Tune inside. I set it so that it would only allow three or four notes in an octave, notes which would work within the scale of a solo I wanted to play, and set the "grab time" or "glide time" of the unit so it would take it half a second to one second to lock onto the pitch and pull it into tune. This prevented any "stair-stepping" of the pitch like you hear on a Two Chains vocal or whatever, so you could get wild and wiggly pitch sweeps, but once you landed on a pitch it would pull you into tune. Take the clean, dry output of the Theremin right into the ATR-1, and since a Theremin's raw output is basically a single sine or sawtooth wave, the ATR-1 has no problem at all locking onto it, and produces no weird formants or other artifacts on the output. Take the output of the ATR-1 to a TC Electronics FireWorx multi-effects unit for tons of distortion, delay, and reverb, and boom. Wild-n-wiggly Theremin solos that are still in tune with the song. The way the ATR-1 works is you define which of the twelve notes in the octave are "permitted" and which are "not permitted", and then the input is always forced to conform to one of the permitted notes, and that grid repeats across all the octaves so you can play low, you can play high, doesn't matter - the output will always glide to the nearest permitted note in whatever octave you happen to be in. It. Works. Perfectly." www.reddit.com/r/nin/comments/gkf9r7/im_charlie_clouser_a_long_time_ago_i_played/fqrht79?context=3

[@Arenow]

@@h4724-q6j This is amazing to read! I got obsessed with this song back in the day, loved this live version because it made a great show on a cerebral instrumental song. Thank you for sharing, this comment should be pinned!

[@backfru]

What the hell is a theremin? How did I get here? I can't get out of the internet and talk to Molly Please help me bring up my emails

[@wyattoutlaw2370]

Love Clouser’s theremin solo! It does the track justice in the absence of Garson.

[@terry85mar]

Not a solo but still cool.

[@agnieszkam9605]

Just like I imagined

[@aenima-tool9418]

Agnieszka M its The Perfect Drug... 😉😊👌

[@aenima-tool9418]

Agnieszka M. I Wish I was there.....😛

[@aenima-tool9418]

Agnieszka M. The Mark. Has Been Made here.... most diff.

[@ShadyAcacia]

Just like we imagined

[@vrlc9233]

You are an Angel with a Halo!

[@BegToDiffah]

Holy crap, are you kidding me? How did I ever miss this?

[@fadjeb8254]

This song or the actual performance?

[@dondre3000]

It's the versatility that does it for me. Trent's range in terms of ***what*** he can do is second to none in rock music. Voice has never been the best, but when you build so much around the voice, it matters less. Pure genius. MJK has Danny, Adam, and Justin writing all that great music for him to sing over. Very different.

[@carissageorge8195]

Donald Austin His voice is great. Pure fuckin' genius.

[@VuotoPneumaNN]

I don't care if Rubin or Alessandro are better musicians, this will forever be my NIN lineup.

[@gilbertsalazar9823]

Just different eras of NIN!!

[@terry85mar]

Nobody said they're better because they're not.

[@Tistouyou]

2:06 to 2:23 gave me some of the strongest goosebumps i've ever had

[@TheLiquidflight]

Every fucking time. Their voices add so much in that exact spot in that exact way. Mind blowing.

[@MarcelGrieder]

That bit was in the teaser video back then, way before youtube was existing. It's one of NIN's best moments.

[@namelessthing5858]

@@MarcelGrieder holy crap, i think i remember those Greetings and well wishes from san jose california

[@michaelcaccuitto6434]

Wow, me too. That’s crazy.

[@pl-boostcreep]

It was just like I imagined !

[@amandagillis8841]

I love the thumbnail 😍

[@bnan4224]

This and la mer always give me goosebumps

[@kisslena]

Same here!

[@vrlc9233]

Still rocking in 2020

[@robertomaclean1140]

I have seen this video very times and still bristles the skin

[@SuperKeybored]

the best live version

[@tol.M_ngo]

Just like you imagined... What a energy. 6 6 6 ❌❌❌

[@paulwisham5943]

Still great

[@mailliw8647]

Greatest one word ...eeeeeaaaaaarrrrrgggg!!!...song ever written

[@LexXaoc]

My favorite.

[@oSitaRuSo]

Just Perfect !!!

[@vrlc9233]

Another one of those NIN classics! Fuckin' beautiful mate!

[@melissarey2973]

A theramin. Hahahaha. Beautiful.

[@kisslena]

Amazing Concert! Pure Art!❤️‍🔥

[@leosvt8844]

wonderful!

[@jagod7]

Zio Benny nkkkkIU

[@matthewchaney8550]

Words get in the way.

[@nerdyjuice7153]

ufff en el cielo cuando escucho esta canción

[@franklingarcia4712]

God, I love this song!!

[@peterk9818]

Song gives me the fuckn chills!👌🤘☝️

[@michaelgoodyear9369]

So badass

[@adamblister6005]

I'm convinced Trent Reznor is an evolved being from another planet. Humans can't make music like this.

[@soulcrusher25]

Pete Agassi I like to think of it more as if aliens ever attacked us, we could use his music to defeat them.

[@adamblister6005]

WarMachine 1776 Not defeat them, because we in no way could do that. But we could certainly appease them with a NIN live show.

[@ShadyAcacia]

Adam Blister ghosts 31 would be my track for the invasion

[@noktuloespa2083]

Excellent choice of music, sir!

[@shb1978]

+TheStormfall I LIKE WHAT YOU GOT! GOOD JOB!

[@michaelplurad8670]

“This is where we fight! This is where they die!”

[@FernandoPCasas]

Masterpiece like a Picaso Picture

[@A_New_Yorker_Lost_In_Florida]

one of few places i feel at home

[@marcobrugnaro9150]

Perfection

[@thebrigadier27]

awesome!

[@dogbono166]

Thank you gurufs2, great job ;)

[@MrAlejandroiltopo]

i love you

[@prassicaa]

Time travel needs to become a thing.

[@lqe.4963]

I wonder how much of any overdubs were done to this. A lot of parts sound just like the studio version.

[@odonnemt]

Fucking legendary

[@mesghenna2012]

we about to die we salute you ✊🏿9

[@TheLiquidflight]

OMG this is sooo fucking EPIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

[@PacificCoastAuto]

Here for the theremin.

[@klido13]

300

[@adamblister6005]

What the hell is that sound at 1:20 and what fucking instrument is that?

[@benditmer6627]

Its a theremin (mind the spelling) also used at the start of 'sin'

[@adamblister6005]

Ben Ditmer Wow! Thanks! Just looked it up and it's bonkers! Played without touching! WTF?! This is why I love Nine Inch Nails -- always original and unique sounds!

[@benditmer6627]

No probs. Seen some trippy vids on here of people playing them

[@JakeLaraFX]

+Pete Agassi it's actually been used before in a band, it isn't original. Led zeppelin used it in their song "Whole Lotta love" and some other songs

[@Woutje86]

What count is this? Like 9/10 or something?

[@darkdanny9]

only 10k views that explains all the ignorance and blindness in this world if only regular humans humans could get this expressions...

[@alexandermitros7697]

well, I think that if everyone could listen to NIN, it wouldn't be that good..

[@redprince9]

on another note (totally unrelated, of course;), it would be absolutely epic if self-described intelligent entities would quit using (among other things) the inputs they derive the most value from as a basis for subjecting others to degrading perceptions while elevating themselves to some sort of psuedo-uber-human/sentience by route of disillusions of grandeur as a means of coping with their own lack of confidence and/or self-worth instead of actually doing something that fucking matters, because that shizz be hard work yo! It's so much easier to just tear others down and sit on a hollow throne of bullshit.

[@charlesbelindevregille7465]

What's left to hear after that?

[@stefanocoggi448]

Johann Sebastian Bach reincarnation ❤❤🎸🎸

[@Sreiko1]

Изеђено!

[@phobiazzzero4935]

THISISSPARTA

[@KikiRevenge]

Drummer is sick.

[@veemon9280]

A pheromone in a rock song....dang

[@gfdhghfjjhjjhhk]

This is Spartaaaa.. 😂

[@joekiddyshaw5757]

Fuck Yeah ! 🤟

[@EduardSLVRU]

This song is a total mental breakdown.