"The Ritual" was produced and composed by Trent Reznor for Saul Williams' third studio album, The Inevitable Rise And Liberation Of NiggyTardust!.
Contents
Song Credits
- Music by Trent Reznor (Leaving Hope)
- Words by Saul Williams (Punk Rock of Gibraltar/EMI)
- Vox: Saul Williams
Appearances
Other
Versions
The Ritual
This version is heard on The Inevitable Rise And Liberation Of NiggyTardust!.
The Ritual (Instrumental)
This version was leaked on a internal industry promo CD.
Saul Williams on "The Ritual"
This song scared me too. Well, not at first. Here's the story. While we were working on the 2nd draft of demos at the Mailbu studio, Trent told me one friday that he might send over a few tracks he'd been working on for me to vibe with over the weekend. Saturday night comes and I get an email from Trent with a yousendit file attached. Already I'm super excited. We'd been working together for some time by now and I was eager to see where his head was musically aside from the tracks we had been working on together. Also, I had developed a habit of writing a song a night which means I was in a zone and my house was charged with creative energy. My friend/roomate Beau seemed to be just as excited about the album as I was. He would come down from his cave and rock out with me as I danced circles in my room. But with this new music from Trent we both knew we were gonna have a fun and LOUD night, so before listening we lit candles and set the stage. A freind even gifted us with some chocolate treats... Nice. When this beat came out of the speakers we fuckin lost it. I think I had it on repeat for like 5 hours straight. I remember thinking, "what kind of African pills has Trent been poppin?!'. Beau, who's a Chinese American poet from Oklahoma, asked the same question, as we practiced traditional African Dance in front of the fireplace. During the course of the evening I recorded the lyrics which are from The Dead Emcee Scrolls and they just fit the track beautifully. Later, in the mixing process the track scared me. Although I knew its connection to the story and the reason for the violent lyrics, I felt like I was conjuring the devil. Then I remembered that there was no devil and kept dancing. Dancing through the mayhem is Niggy's story in a nutshell. I almost opted against putting this song on the album, but, truly, it wouldn't be complete with out it. We mixed it on 7/7/7.
Lyrics
The PDF file contains the following under "The Ritual":
The Writings on the wall.