Music

NICE: Graceful late-career artistic transitions

by Richard Trapunski

In our annual festive Naughty and Nice feature, AUX compiles the best and worst of the year in music.

It’s often embarrassing when an actor attempts to make a record or when a director decides to become a music producer, but if this past year is any indication it can sometimes work in the opposite direction.

Trent Reznor is no stranger to awards, but this year he warped our minds. After hearing his name read by Nicole Kidman and applauded by Hugh Jackman, he hugged his wife, buttoned his tuxedo, stepped up to the podium and thanked the Academy. Trent Reznor, the driving force behind Nine Inch Nails, the man who once pissed off parents everywhere with the line “I want to fuck you like an animal”, had won an Oscar for Best Original Score.

Only two years ago, Reznor tentatively retired Nine Inch Nails with the Wave Goodbye Tour, presumably because his comfortable domesticity had robbed him of his angst. In 2010 he was solicited by director David Fincher to provide the score for his Mark Zuckerberg biopic The Social Network (a film that incidentally starred halted pop star Justin Timberlake in a scene-stealing support role). Alongside frequent collaborator Atticus Ross, the one-time industrialist rose to what seemed like an impossible task – he elevated a script rife with wry, understated dialogue and long scenes of uninterrupted computer coding to the level of tense psychological thriller.

Reznor’s Oscar win pulls him only an Emmy and a Tony away from an EGOT and has already propelled him towards his next composer gig, as the scorer for David Fincher’s American much-hyped adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which comes out in theatres this week. By all means he could transition into the film industry full-time, but he’s already hinted that he plans to return to the NIN well in 2012.

That’s less likely for garage-hero Jack White, who used 2011 to break up the White Stripes, the band that propelled him to rock stardom, and focus on his other interests. And he had a lot of other interests.

White has clearly entered the Dylan-playing-gospel phase of his career in which he’s realized he’s earned the right to do just about anything he wants without alienating his fans, and has exercised that right under the banner of his self-owned, self-run Nashville-based Third Man Records. In 2011 alone, White has played collaborated with everyone from rapper Black Milk to R&B icon Wanda Jackson to fraternal garage-rock duo JEFF The Brotherhood, but has also put out some WTF-worthy releases by Insane Clown Posse, Conan O’Brien and an auctioneer, while tinkering with the physical vinyl format.

Jack White might just be bored, but his constant experimentation as a label boss has produced some legitimately interesting results.

Usually it’s best for musicians to stick to what they’re good at, but Jack White and Trent Reznor have proven they can transition to other roles and make it look graceful.

Return to the Naughty and Nice master list.