TRENT REZNOR is a man who proves that computer
technology can be used to create and to dream. Just as many so—called Rock
bands in the 1990s have taken the pain, fears and joys of the Blues and reduced
them to the level of a marketing exercise, so Trent and his band Nine Inch
Nails have invaded the very fortress of the ‘90s and distilled the grey
effluent of cybernetics into a potion so dark, challenging and poisonous.
“I grew up in Eyrie, Pennsylvania,“ explains Reznor. “There was no
Underground scene as such, no college radio stations. So I got into generic
‘70s music. Kiss was my favourite band. It wasn‘t until later when I escaped
from there that I got into bands with a bit more integrity.“
Reznor and his Nails want to make people aware,
bleed on a generation who worship the plasticine notion of identikit mannequins
weened from the same PVC womb. Nine Inch Nails want you to listen.
“We are selling a product, I admit that. But
the idea is to put out something challenging, a record that might make people
say, ‘Hey, that‘s cool. Maybe what we‘re used to is a piece of shit!”
Reznor found that when “music and computers
meshed together in the early ‘80s“, suddenly he was given an opportunity to get
involved in creating an art form. Nine Inch Nails‘ debut album - very much his
own effort, titled ‘Pretty Hate Machine‘ — is the first fruit of his implantation.
It eschews the “macho Rock stance“ for an awareness of the intense ravages
within chromium cadavers. He offers a cyanide calypso, a cadence of Depeche
Mode, Ministry, Stockhausen and the MC5. It is as remarkable as it is
formidable.
Nine Inch Nails (very much Reznor and transient
partners) are the embodiment of the true sexual nature of Rock music, of the
realism of self—destruction.
“We are not Guns n‘ Roses. We don‘t pretend to
do what they do. But we have a definite destructive edge.“
Believe. And learn to feel music again…
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