Reznor, never one to refrain from speaking his mind, ends up confronting one of the record label "sales guys" at a meet and greet during his stay in Brisbane. He asks them why his CDs and DVDs cost 6,7, and even 8 more dollars then everybody elses.

The sales guy says it's "Because your packaging is a lot more expensive." But, apparently Reznor pays for this out of his cut form the CD, so this is a moot argument. "I know how much the packaging costs -- it costs me, not them, it costs me 83 cents more to have a CD with the colour-changing ink on it. I'm taking the hit on that, not them."


And I just said "That's the most insulting thing I've heard. I've garnered a core audience that you feel it's OK to rip off? F--- you'. That's also why you don't see any label people here, 'cos I said 'F--- you people. Stay out of my f---ing show. If you wanna come, pay the ticket like anyone else. F--- you guys". They're thieves.

Many more quotes from Reznor in the full article.

I clipped an earlier article that leads into this one.

Even if I didn't like his music (I do) I'd pay the $4.00 to download it just to support him & stick it to the record labels.

Apparently (according to his site) he's releasing a remix collection online soon

I gotta say, Trent Reznor really calls them like they are. The most realistic man in Hollywood! When he heard Johny Cash cover "Hurt," I believe his comment was something like "Wow, I never realized I was that good of a song writer!"

He's probably the only rock star I can think of not on some insane ego trip. Pops for that, all around!

Yeah Trent Reznor is awesome. The sad thing is that the record companies could make so much more money by just dropping the costs to download music. There should be no reason for it to cost as much to buy a CD as it does to download it from iTunes.

I mean they have no packaging costs, no physical cd, no theft before the store even gets it (which costs them out of pocket right away as opposed to illegal downloading), and no damaged item returns.

If they just figured out how much profit per song they made on their old model and applied that to the new model then they could probably sell downloads for 1/3 to 1/4 of their current cost and less people would steal the music.