Okay, I’d like to take this opportunity to make a public service announcement. Trent Reznor announced that he was giving away free downloads of his new Strobelight album, produced by Timbaland, on April first. This seemed both hilarious and topical as Blue Blood has covered goth-industrial music since 1992 and even the Blue Blood precursor BLT ::: Black Leather Times had press coverage in that vein.

Although the email collection form on the Nine Inch Nails site did not request any financial information, NIN.com did bear the statement, “Your credit card will be charged $18.98 plus a $10 digital delivery convenience fee.” Apparently there are a lot of savvy consumers out there because, after we posted the feature and told Blue Blood’s sixty thousand close personal MySpace friends about the NIN article and opportunity for the download, we were deluged with messages and emails from angry consumers.

It seems that a lot of you are able to figure out from the fine print that you may not be getting a free lunch. You are apparently not capable, however, of reading a calendar. Allow me to repeat my previous statement with needed emphasis: Trent Reznor announced that he was giving away free downloads of his new Strobelight album, produced by Timbaland, on April first. The Strobelight album download announcement was an April Fool’s joke and I thought it was an awfully witty one, particularly when you read through the track listing.

You know how you are clever enough not to be sold on a refreshing and tasty beverage by some slick television commercial with hot chicks in it? And you know how this means that the beverage industry has sent a fleet of hot chicks out to bars to pretend they like you while telling you they totally love Bacardi or Red Bull or whatever? Or did you think you suddenly turned into more of a chick magnet, like it used to be that gothic and punk girls loved you, but now trim blondes seem like they crave your dick and it is awesome. Although you have yet to close with one.

Basically, my comment on this is that sometimes, when you try to hard to be a savvy consumer, you miss the actual joke. Please stop sending me hate mail over your inaccurately perceived concerns about Trent Reznor’s fictional album release. It’s a joke, an April Fool’s prank. Trent Reznor’s comment on this is, “I may have to actually write “pussygrinder”! Anybody have Sheryl Crow’s #?”

Trent Reznor announced today that his whole new album Strobelight is available for download on the Nine Inch Nails web site. The following song list contains a who’s who of people who guest on other people’s tracks.

track list:

1. intro skit
2. everybody’s doing it (featuring chris martin, jay-z AND bono)
3. black t-shirt
4. pussygrinder (featuring sheryl crow)
5. coffin on the dancefloor
6. this rhythm is infected
7. slide to the dark side
8. even closer (featuring justin timberlake and maynard james keenan)
9. on the list (she’s not)
10. clap trap crack slap
11. laid, paid and played (featuring fergie of the black eyed peas and al jourgensen)
12. feel like being dead again
13. still hurts (featuring alicia keys)
14. outro skit

Here are the instructions from the NIN site to get your absolutely free free free goth-industrial album via download, before it is available anywhere else:

“To download NIN’s new full-length album Strobe Light, PRODUCED BY TIMBALAND, enter a valid email address . . . A download link will be sent to you immediately. Your credit card will be charged $18.98 plus a $10 digital delivery convenience fee. Your files will arrive as windows media files playable on quite a few players with your name embedded all over them just in case you lose them. You will also receive an exclusive photo and a free email account with our partner Google’s Gmail service.

Your email will be kept confidential and will not be used for spam, unless we can make some money selling it.”

So, per Trent Reznor, those are the sweet sweet terms you can get today for your very own free download of the new NIN Strobelight. After initially checking it out, I think “on the list (she’s not)” is my favorite little ditty, but let me know which you all enjoy most.