sign in sign up
<<
Home , Atticus Ross, Gone Girl (soundtrack), Head Like a Hole, Nine Inch Nails, Trent Reznor

The perfect score For the soundtrack of next month’s , director revived an award-winning partnership with rocker and music producer .

by Christopher Ross PHOTOGRAPHY BY pari dukovic brothers grim “It’s been an uncompromising, fantastic creative process,” says Reznor (left) of scoring with Ross (right) for Fincher.

135 M ting his back adjusted. “I was listening to that calming, calming, to that listening was “I adjusted. back his ting get was he while him to came first idea The laughing. says, he parlor!” a massage not a spa, said “I ferently: pelling interdisciplinary partnerships. com most today’s of one formed they’ve 2000, since Reznor’s of acollaborator Ross, with Together noia. para and terror of visions shot gorgeously delivered films—including with decades two past the over success critical and commercial both achieved similarly who Fincher’s, unlike not is arc career His workdays. eight-hour of regimen astrict maintains he and T-shirt, tight a and haircut atrim he’s sporting festivals—today music ’90s of banshee mud-caked long-haired, the from way, the transformed he Along soundscapes. synth-riddled produced, expertly but bleak ety—into anxi alienation, emotions—rage, dark channeled that a Hole” Like “Head and “Closer” like hits with ing follow aglobal built he present, the into and the through albums studio major eight Releasing “industrial.” as classified music machine-made heavy, of the genre in figure apioneering been has and unravel.” unravel.” and to curdle starting sound that imagine then And OK. everything’s like feel you make to tries it artificially that way Reznor. “The says parlors,’” massage in hear you music terrible really the about ‘Think said, “He with. start to Ross and Reznor for inspiration specific avery had Pike), Fincher Rosamund by (played wife his of murder possible and disappearance the in pect sus a becomes who Affleck), Ben by (played Dunne Nick ahusband, about thriller literary best-selling Gone Girl Gone For first. narrative put always right, BEHI his first Nine Inch Nails album, album, Nails Inch Nine first his of release 1989 the Reznor,since for who afirst was That orchestra. alive with before day the recorded baritone. a sonorous in he deadpans workload,” of terms in overwhelming of verge the on been it hasn’t say can’t “I Apple. by acquired recently was which Music, Beats work with his continuing also tour, while aNIN on road the hitting be he’ll in, is score the as day.soon As the of beverage caffeinated seventh onhis aman of manner the with chair his in tensely sits frontman, Nails Inch Nine 49-year-old the Reznor, cigarette. electronic an on distractedly pulls Reznor, with co-produced frequently has who ducer pro and composer London-born acerebral 46, Ross, soundtrack. for best aGrammy and nod Globe Golden a garnered Tattoo Dragon the With Girl 2011’son The effort second their and music, original for best Oscar an netted Network 2010’s for Social score The first Their high: are expectations auteur, and the with tion collabora third their is This week. following the due is Girl Gone movie, new Fincher’s about the walls closing in on N on in closing walls the about For For Fincher recalls the initial conversation slightly dif slightly conversation initial the recalls Fincher Today they’ll listen to music for the they they film for the to music listen they’ll Today M THE ND Gone Girl Gone U , an adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s 2012 2012 Flynn’s Gillian of adaptation , an SI Seven Reznor, right, says he and Ross, far far Ross, and he says right, C Reznor, usicians usicians fatalism. Their score for David for David score Their fatalism. game of air an with deadline ing approach arapidly of barrel the down staring Hollywood, in dio a stu in sitting are Ross Atticus , Panic Room ick. H ick. , in theaters October 3, 3, October theaters , in TRE ow does that sound?” that ow does Pretty N and Zodiac and T REZ , “ W N e’ll think OR —that —that and and ------, his hand at creating an entirely new soundtrack for for soundtrack new entirely an atcreating hand his to try Reznor to ask decided he that score a temporary Ghosts I-IV album 2008 NIN’s from elements using himself found and Network Social The of versions early on working was he when Seven 1995’s of sequence credits opening the on “Closer” Reznor’s of a used and “Only” single 2005 for NIN’s video music the made director careers—the their in earlier paths artistic crossed arrangements. orchestral the by accentuated and melodies piano doleful with interspersed synths haunting lilting, of posed com ascore is result The hug.” you a to give attempting that’s music with to start was notion the So wife. good the Christian, good the neighbor, good the of facade the about is movie The this. into to tap we need thought, and music placating Fincher and Reznor had had Reznor and Fincher . But it was only only it was . But - creators—what creators—what “they’re world world “they’re unlike what cgi unlike they do with with do they music is not not is music – artists do D visually.” avid as as

Fincher band 12 Rounds, which Ross started with his wife, wife, his with started Ross which Rounds, 12 band Ross’s co-produced onand consulted Reznor turn, In 2000. in Nails Inch to Nine wizardry technical his ing lend Caroline—began Radio station radio pirate ’60s A few advances. Fincher’s declined firmly but politely sons), two has now he whom with Maandig, Mariqueen (to singer married gotten just had and touring from out burnt Reznor, was who movie. a feature-length

son of Ian Ross, founder of of founder Ross, Ian of son the and Ross Liberty model of Ross—brother aughts. early the in friends became and met first TV, and help. to film for composing experience some had who Ross, tapped Reznor he’d accepted, Once score. the on to take him to convince managed Fincher and offer, director’s the to able accommodate being for not again toout apologize reached later, Reznor months The L.A.-based musical duo duo musical L.A.-based The -

grooming by kristen shaw singer Claudia Sarne, with whom he has two children. (Ross also has a son from an earlier relationship with Amy Fleetwood.) Reznor and Ross’s approach to scoring is singular in mainstream cinema. With a few exceptions, notably 2007’s There Will be Blood, which ’s scored, and 2009’s The Road, which has an original soundtrack by Australian musicians and , classically trained compos- ers write scores for films that are already locked or in the final editing stages. It’s a cut-to-fit procedure that puts the emphasis on efficiency. “Like buying things by the yard,” says Fincher. At most, a pop star might contribute an original song to play over the film titles or credits (as Adele did for the latest James Bond itera- tion, , for example). But Reznor and Ross often begin talking about the role of music with Fincher even before the first scene has been shot, so that their score evolves in tandem with the movie’s production, operating like an alternate script that shapes the direction of the film as it is in turn shaped by the film. “It’s multiple times the work because you’re fixing and modifying and rewriting right to the end,” says Reznor. But it’s that quality, Ross says, that gives the score a feeling of seamlessness. “The music becomes part of the film’s DNA,” he says. “To create that trans- porting experience in the cinema, all the different elements of the film need to be one piece of art.” For , Fincher asked for “the sound of creativity,” and Reznor and Ross responded with ’80s-era synths and pointillist electronica whose rhythms seemed to reflect a speeding mind in danger of running vertiginously off keel. Fincher actually trimmed the film down 10 minutes in response to the score, and one scene—the much- applauded Henley Royal Regatta sequence—was edited entirely to fit Reznor’s madcap, Moog-like version of Edvard Grieg’s 1875 piece “In The Hall of the Mountain King.” The score for The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo had a more abrasive, droning qual- ity, befitting its hacker-punk hero Lisbeth Sanders and the film’s icy, Nordic landscapes. Reznor and Ross blurred the line between music and industrial sounds, in one scene tuning the score to the hum of a floor polisher that appeared onscreen. When They’re world creators—what they do with music is scoring films for Fincher has naturally made them beginning on Gone Girl, the duo stumbled across not unlike what CGI artists do visually.” a hot commodity in Hollywood. But they have little the haunting woodwind-esque motif while playing In the studio, Reznor and Ross operate like two interest in composing for anyone besides Fincher. with homemade , a sound that gradually lobes of the same brain, the latter structuring and “Having limited experience with others, I’ve been evolved with the movie into queasy orchestral melo- shaping the former’s intuitive vision. Over the years, astounded by the clarity of his vision—especially dies. “The piece travels the journey of the story,” says they’ve honed their method to the point that it’s nearly when you’ve seen it not be that,” says Ross. Ross, “mutating within itself from something that nonverbal: Reznor begins playing with a number of That said, both Reznor and Ross perceive in the feels warm and loving to something that feels so sick. unstructured melodies and musical themes, which he medium of film a rare opportunity to immerse an But we close on the same music we open on.” then hands to Ross to arrange. “That process frees me audience in a collective artistic experience. In an age Over the course of the past seven months, Reznor up to lose myself in raw composition, impressionistic when most music concerts are a sea of cellphones and Ross composed batches of music that resulted stuff almost,” says Reznor. “And I can leave the room, and digital devices, “the cinema is the one place left in two hours of raw themes for the film. Their work catch my breath while he’s mocking it up, and when I where people switch off their lives,” says Ross. For reflected what was developing onscreen. “It’s fun for come back in, four out of five times, it’s better than the Reznor, whose live concerts feature a Wagnerian us to go off on tangents and operate in purely sub- thing I had in my head. Without me saying one word.” assault of visual effects, lights and video screens, conscious mode,” says Reznor. “We’ll think about Both men project a capacity for self-control that it’s as if movies have become a final refuge for music that feeling of the walls closing in for Nick. How suggests their preference for expressing emotion appreciation in an era of near-constant distraction. does that sound?” Instead of focusing on technicali- through music. “They’re both extremely quiet,” “For a couple hours, they’re locked into the story, ties, the two speak the language of narrative with says Fincher. “They’re not the kind of guys who get escaping their lives, being taken on a journey,” says Fincher and his team, seeing themselves as sonic nervous that they’re not saying anything. It’s not a Reznor. “As a musician, it gets back to being able to storytellers. “It’s never, ‘This needs to have a lot of cultivated opacity—they just hold their cards close. emotionally connect with somebody. At the end of reverb,’ ” says Fincher. “The conversation is almost They don’t have time for a lot of bullshit.” the day, what matters to me is that I can get what’s in always, ‘What feeling are you trying to evoke?’ Reznor and Ross’s award-winning track record my head into your ears.” •

137