''An Omen EP'' (stylized as ''An omen EP_'') was the second
extended play
An extended play record, usually referred to as an EP, is a musical recording that contains more tracks than a single but fewer than an album or LP record. release by American
post-industrial
In sociology, the post-industrial society is the stage of society's development when the service sector generates more wealth than the manufacturing sector of the economy.
The term was originated by Alain Touraine and is closely related to s ...
group
How to Destroy Angels, released November 13, 2012. Produced by
Nine Inch Nails
Nine Inch Nails, commonly abbreviated as NIN and stylized as NIИ, is an American industrial rock band formed in Cleveland in 1988. Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Trent Reznor was the only permanent member of the band ...
frontman
Trent Reznor
Michael Trent Reznor (born May 17, 1965) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, and composer. He serves as the lead vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and principal songwriter of the industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails, wh ...
, his wife
Mariqueen Maandig
Mariqueen Maandig Reznor (''née'' Maandig; born April 5, 1981) is a Filipino-American singer, songwriter, and musician.
She is the vocalist for How to Destroy Angels & the former vocalist of Los Angeles-based rock band West Indian Girl.
Care ...
and longtime collaborator
Atticus Ross
Atticus Matthew Cowper Ross (born 16 January 1968) is an English musician, record producer, composer, and audio engineer. Along with Trent Reznor, he won the Academy Award for Best Original Score for ''The Social Network'' in 2010. In 2013, th ...
, the EP contained various tracks later issued on their 2013 debut album, ''
Welcome Oblivion
''Welcome Oblivion'' is the debut studio album by American post-industrial group How to Destroy Angels. It was released on March 5, 2013 on Columbia Records. It was described as "sensual electronic rock" by the ''Los Angeles Times''.
Promotion
T ...
''. It focused on Maandig's vocal style, with a lighter tone than
its predecessor.
The full EP was released for streaming purposes on November 8, 2012 at
The Hype Machine
Hype Machine is a music blog aggregator created by Anthony Volodkin.
History
Hype Machine was originally a music database created in 2005 by Anthony Volodkin, then a sophomore computer science major at Hunter College.Heilemann, JohCapturing the ...
and the band's official
SoundCloud
SoundCloud is an online audio distribution platform and music sharing website that enables its users to upload, promote, and share audio. Founded in 2007 by Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud is one of the largest music streaming se ...
channel, five days before the official release date, then was released in digital and vinyl formats afterwards. As with many of Reznor's official releases, it was designated with a unique name and number: ''An omen EP_'' is "SIGIL 03".
The release was announced by Reznor in 2011, and initially slated for a November 2011 street date. However, due to Reznor's dissatisfaction with the output, it was put on hold until he felt it was up to standard, taking it on what he referred to as a "Mulholland Test Drive". The title was announced on September 22, 2012 as ''An Omen EP''.
This was Reznor's first musical release (from either Nine Inch Nails or How to Destroy Angels) on
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music, Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Sony. It was founded on Janua ...
, and his first non-independent release since Nine Inch Nails' ''
Year Zero Remixed
''Year Zero Remixed'' (stylized as ''Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D'') is the third remix album by American industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails, released in the United States on November 20, 2007,
and in the United Kingdom six days later. It features remixed ve ...
'', which was released on
Interscope
Interscope Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group through its Interscope Geffen A&M imprint. Founded in late 1990 by Jimmy Iovine and Ted Field as a $20 million joint venture with Atlantic Records of Warner Musi ...
.
Promotion
The first single, "Keep It Together", was debuted on
Zane Lowe
Alexander Zane Reid Lowe (born 7 August 1973) is a New Zealand radio DJ, live DJ, record producer, and television presenter.
After an early career in music creation, production and DJing, he moved to the UK in 1997. He came to prominence thro ...
's
BBC Radio One
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance, ...
show on October 8, 2012, and the track was released via
digital download a day later.
Art direction
Artwork, graphics and promotional photos were conceived by the entire band, and primarily executed by
Rob Sheridan
Robert Sheridan (born October 11, 1979) is an American graphic designer, art director, photographer, and comic book author best known for his extensive work with the band Nine Inch Nails.
Biography
Sheridan attended art school at New York's Pr ...
. He used a technique of creating
glitch art
Glitch art is the practice of using digital or analog errors for aesthetic purposes by either corrupting digital data or physically manipulating electronic devices. Glitches appear in visual art such as the film ''A Colour Box'' (1935) by Len Lye, ...
similar to his previous work with Nine Inch Nails, not with
Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Inc. for Windows and macOS. It was originally created in 1988 by Thomas and John Knoll. Since then, the software has become the industry standard not only in raster ...
effects, but instead by placing raw images onto analog
VHS tapes, then disrupting those very signals and photographing distortion through a
CRT monitor.
Release
All versions were released on November 13, 2012.
*The EP was released in
MP3
MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany, with support from other digital scientists in the United States and elsewhere. Origin ...
formats across all MP3 retailers, but the only way to obtain the high-quality and lossless audio formats for the release was to order through the band's own webstore.
*The EP was released on
12", 180-gram
vinyl
Vinyl may refer to:
Chemistry
* Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer
* Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation
* Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry
* Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl m ...
and that was the only way to obtain the album on a physical medium, as a
CD copy of the EP was not pressed. When ordered through the band's webstore, initial copies came packaged with an exclusive 12" remix
white label
A white label record is a vinyl record with white labels attached. There are several variations each with a different purpose. Variations include test pressings, white label promos, and plain white labels.
Test pressings
Test pressings, usua ...
pressing of the EP's lead single "Keep It Together". This limited offer has since sold out.
Reception
Critical reception
Critical response to the EP was generally favorable, with an average rating of 78% based on 11 professional reviews on
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
.
[Critic Reviews for An Omen EP](_blank)
/ref>
Track listing
Credits and personnel
;Written, arranged, produced, programmed, performed and packaged by How to Destroy Angels
*Mariqueen Maandig
Mariqueen Maandig Reznor (''née'' Maandig; born April 5, 1981) is a Filipino-American singer, songwriter, and musician.
She is the vocalist for How to Destroy Angels & the former vocalist of Los Angeles-based rock band West Indian Girl.
Care ...
*Trent Reznor
Michael Trent Reznor (born May 17, 1965) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, and composer. He serves as the lead vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and principal songwriter of the industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails, wh ...
*Atticus Ross
Atticus Matthew Cowper Ross (born 16 January 1968) is an English musician, record producer, composer, and audio engineer. Along with Trent Reznor, he won the Academy Award for Best Original Score for ''The Social Network'' in 2010. In 2013, th ...
*Rob Sheridan
Robert Sheridan (born October 11, 1979) is an American graphic designer, art director, photographer, and comic book author best known for his extensive work with the band Nine Inch Nails.
Biography
Sheridan attended art school at New York's Pr ...
;Production
*Alan Moulder
Alan Moulder (born 11 June 1959) is an English record producer, mixing engineer, and audio engineer.
Early life
Moulder was born on 11 June 1959 in Boston, Lincolnshire. He was educated at Boston Grammar School. He had an interest in music from ...
– mixing
*Michael Patterson Michael Patterson may refer to:
*Michael Patterson (animator), American director and animator, creator of MC Skat Kat
*Michael Patterson (English footballer) (1905 – after 1931)
*Michael Patterson (Australian footballer) (1941–2002), AFL player
...
– mixing (4)
*Tom Baker – mastering (at Precision Mastering, Hollywood, CA
Hollywood is a neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, California. Its name has come to be a shorthand reference for the U.S. film industry and the people associated with it. Many notable film studios, such as Columbia Pictures, ...
)
*Blumpy – engineer
*Dustin Mosley – additional engineering
*Rob Sheridan – photography, art direction/post-production
*Tamar Levine – photography
*Rebel Waltz – management
*Marc Geiger – booking (WME)
*Heathcliff Beru – publicity (Life or Death PR)
See also
*'' The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters''
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Omen, An
2012 EPs
Columbia Records EPs
Trip hop EPs
How to Destroy Angels (band) EPs