See You At The Show: Nine Inch Nails at The Forum, September 6, 2008

See You At The Show is a feature where I will review a recent concert of a 90's artist or fondly recall memorable shows from my 90's past. The title "See You At the Show" is a reference to the song "Middle Name" by MxPx. If you don't remember MxPx, they are a fab punk band that are sometimes remembered for being Christian, but that shouldn't be held against them.



MxPx - "Middle Name" live in São Paulo

NINE INCH NAILS, THE FORUM, INGLEWOOD, CA - SEPTEMBER 6,2008



Nine Inch Nails was my first concert at the age of 15 in 1995. I saw them at Nassau Coliseum in Long Island on the classic Self Destruct Tour supporting the then-new, now essential Downward Spiral album. This event was so classic (Adam Ant made an appearance to perform a few songs, including "Physical [You're So])that I was actually more nervous than jazzed to see them a second time this past month. I am quite an adherent to the early NIN industrial sound, despite all my efforts to get into the more muscular rock sound he's developed in the past few years.

I have to say that I am still wedded to the dark, sinuous sensuality of Trent Reznor's early music. Though late period songs like "1,000,000" and "The Hand That Feeds You" rock as hard and aggressively as Trent's post-alcoholism biceps, I didn't start whooping and hollerin' like all the other goth fangirls until tunes like "Piggy," "Wish," and "Terrible Lie" were unfurled. But then it was on. The best thing was the massive video screen light show, an installation which was as impressive as anything at MOMA or the Guggenheim or someplace like that. Check out a poor example courtesy of my cellphone camera:



Nine Inch Nails still kick all kinds of butt, but I was hoping for more of the good old days from them. They played a jazz oddysey style interlude (Spinal Tap fans know what I'm talking about) of the songs "Ghosts" 1, 25 and 19, but I wish that they'd have ditched that for a brutally short and violent song like "Big Man With a Gun," that says everything about how heinous war and male pride is more efficiently than the entire fall of government and destruction-themed concept album, Year Zero:



NIN - "Big Man With a Gun" live in Ghent, Belgium 1994
(Lyrics NSFW for those of you lucky enough to have a job)

Nevertheless, here is a video of Nine Inch Nails at Red Rocks in 2008, for my newbie friends that, just like me, can't get enough of Trent:



NIN - "1,000,000"

For those of you in the know, that is Robin Finck on guitar, a member of Nine Inch Nails' touring band from 1994-2000, who's recently rejoined the group.

Please also check out a Rolling Stone article previewing the Forum show here.