They're Close to My Body: A Hagiography of Nine Inch Nails and Robin Finck (2020)
19 comments
·March 15, 2025dingaling
I'll always feel slightly guilty when I look at the box-set of "And all that could have been" on my shelf.
I bought it from a second-hand music store years ago and when I took it up to the checkout to pay for it ( for it was the days of cash ) the cashier looked heartbroken.
"I'd been saving up to buy that," she whimpered.
I bought it anyway.
I still feel bad, but at least I've opened-up to the HN collective...
keiferski
Trent Reznor really has one of the greatest “maturation” processes of a musical artist that I can think of. His more recent work on The Social Network and The Vietnam War is such a refined, minimalistic version of the specific sound he started forming 20+ years earlier. Not all artists manage to mature in such an elegant way; many never end up quite matching their earlier works, or head into entirely different directions.
Also, a fun random fact: Reznor’s uncle, I believe, ran a heating or HVAC company in the Pittsburgh area. You can still find the occasional industrial device with the REZNOR name on the side.
https://partner.reznorhvac.com/en/as/products/product-unit-h...
thesurlydev
Great post. I've been a fan of NIN for over 30 years and no other band has had such a profound impact on my life. This is saying a lot because I've always been heavily into almost all genres. My biased opinion is that there's something for everyone somewhere in their discography because the music produced has varied quite a bit over the years. If you listen to them and like what you hear, they just announced a new tour.
qwertox
I should have never listened to NIN, but I have; too much. It started with Quake, then a neighbor gifted me a CD of Pretty Hate Machine and I followed it with Broken and The Downward Spiral, which then was the path I went myself.
erikerikson
I'm always a little confused by people such as this one who loved Downward Spiral so much. It was a slide into confusion started in Broken, away from the honesty and struggle embodied in Pretty Hate Machine. It was the Pinnacle of the band's bowing to the commercial market and fall into anger which it didn't recover, IMO, from until reaching a more mature pinnacle (at least in regard to what I wanted from it and what drew me to it) on With Teeth. Right Where It Belongs is one of my all-time favorite songs wherein they both challenge the exterior and interior to greater truth, greater honesty.
keiferski
I always saw TDS as a concept album in the vein of his later, more recent soundtracks. It feels more coherently atmospheric in ways earlier albums didn’t, to me.
With Teeth is actually where I think he went too far into “regular rock music” territory, with the result that it sounds generic and flat to me.
DanHulton
Well, I think they address why they loved it so much in the article, hell, before the first section is finished, even.
Music can be many things at once, and you can be touched by some of the things it is, even if others don't hit for you.
erikerikson
I can't deny the first section described that. My confusion isn't about what the claims are or what surface knowledge presents.
As a peer comment noted, an outlet for anger is part of it, a starting point, and was useful to me too. My comment is about how that album more than others invited me to stay stuck there, remain clad and "protected" from my vulnerability. Tearing down, destroying, and randomizing are always easier than solving, creating, healing, loving, and seeing things just/right. More relevant in this context, startups are hard. Being useful is work.
The beauty in the brashness of NIN is what I believe starts with feeling less alone in your heart and leads to loving yourself and spreading that into your ambient surrounds.
As you note, I am sharing what this art is to me. I cannot say that must or should be what it is to any other person. I still hope that we can be less ashamed and equally vigorous with our caring.
scns
> feeling less alone
For me it was The Knife. Making me realize there are other people feeling the same way.
DrillShopper
Being an angry young man drew me to Downward Spiral, if I'm being honest.
erikerikson
I appreciate the admission. I can't deny benefitting from that too. More in my response to this comments peer.
TOGoS
Different strokes for different folks, I guess. I'm sort of with you, though.
That said, I've come to appreciate The Downward Spiral. But if that was Sonic The Hedgehog 2, With Teeth (and parts of Year Zero) was Sonic The Hedgehog 3. i.e. the master work that built on everything they had learned before they ran out of ideas. The Slip is their Sonic and Knuckles, where they start going in a different, less-cool direction. Of course this is all very much my opinion, man. :)
RASBR89
Downward Spiral - Sonic 2 The Fragile - Sonic 3
BLKNSLVR
I've only read parts of this so far, but it's pretty extraordinary. I'm going to have to commit more time later today to read the whole thing.
I'm a fan of Nine Inch Nails, and music in general, but the way this is written is a few levels beyond what I think I'm even capable of feeling.
noelwelsh
My favourite NiN track, Call Me A Hole: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Lm1FL7gWl4
A bit of an aside, but I love this mashup and hope some of you will enjoy it as well.
scns
And now for something completely different ;)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8S42mc0mcrE
My fave by NiN
SmashngKbds
I've been listening to NIN for 30-something years at this point. I will never stop. This article is very well written and while I can't identify with everything the author describes a whole lot of it lands. I'm really glad I found this on HN today! ...A surprise to be sure, but a welcome one.
null
"It instilled a belief in me that I still have to this day: that any spiritual ailment can be cured by playing music at maximum volume in a small, dark room."
This is so true to me but I never thought of putting it to words like that. I love music and darkness so much that during some especially intense moments in live shows I've been to I close my eyes instead of looking at the band.