Interscope Records
Interscope Records is the record label to which Nine Inch Nails have been signed to from 1992 to 2007 after a much-publicized feud with TVT Records, the first record label to sign the band. Ultimately TVT entered into a joint venture with Interscope Records that allowed Trent Reznor to begin releasing NIN albums on his own Nothing Records imprint, set up with his then manager, John Malm.
Interscope is owned by Universal Music Group, and operates as one third of UMG's Interscope-Geffen-A&M label group.
Criticism
Universal Music Group & Year Zero Pricing
On May 13, 2007 Reznor made a post on his blog on the official Nine Inch Nails website condemning Universal Music Group for their pricing and distribution plans for Year Zero. The full text of that post is as follows:
“As the climate grows more and more desperate for record labels, their answer to their mostly self-inflicted wounds seems to be to screw the consumer over even more. A couple of examples that quickly come to mind:
* The ABSURD retail pricing of Year Zero in Australia. Shame on you, UMG. Year Zero is selling for $34.99 Australian dollars ($29.10 US). No wonder people steal music. Avril Lavigne's record in the same store was $21.99 ($18.21 US). By the way, when I asked a label rep about this his response was: "It's because we know you have a real core audience that will pay whatever it costs when you put something out - you know, true fans. It's the pop stuff we have to discount to get people to buy." So... I guess as a reward for being a "true fan" you get ripped off.
* The dreaded EURO Maxi-single. Nothing but a consumer rip-off that I've been talked into my whole career. No more.
The point is, I am trying my best to make sure the music and items NIN puts in the marketplace have value, substance and are worth you considering purchasing. I am not allowing Capital G to be repackaged into several configurations that result in you getting ripped off.
We are planning a full-length remix collection of substance that will be announced soon.”
Self Release?
After the above post, Reznor stated in an interview that he was interested in self-releasing future material:
"I have one record left that I owe a major label, then I will never be seen in a situation like this again. If I could do what I want right now, I would put out my next album, you could download it from my site at as high a bit-rate as you want, pay $4 through PayPal. Come see the show and buy a T-shirt if you like it. I would put out a nicely packaged merchandise piece, if you want to own a physical thing. And it would come out the day that it's done in the studio, not this "Let's wait three months" bulls---."[1]
On October 8, 2007, Reznor announced that he was a free agent through a posting at both nin.com and The Spiral:
"Hello everyone. I've waited a LONG time to be able to make the following announcement: as of right now Nine Inch Nails is a totally free agent, free of any recording contract with any label. I have been under recording contracts for 18 years and have watched the business radically mutate from one thing to something inherently very different and it gives me great pleasure to be able to finally have a direct relationship with the audience as I see fit and appropriate. Look for some announcements in the near future regarding 2008. Exciting times, indeed.