The stage show Trent Reznor is always trying to copy: “I was in exactly the right place”
A Nine Inch Nails gig is unlike any other.
A heady mix of an industrial rave with the brutality of an unforgiving pit, their live presence is immersive and intoxicating, with their performances bringing their mix of bludgeoning guitars and synthesised rhythms to life with unrelenting strobe lights and unrivalled precision in their musicianship, and as Trent Reznor sings with every ounce of anger, pain and determination he can muster, their shows become a form of catharsis you can lose yourself in – as the best live shows always are.
Before Nine Inch Nails emerged with 1989’s Pretty Hate Machine, churning industrial dance beats with palpable aggression, Reznor was working as a handyman and engineer at the Right Track Studio in Cleveland, Ohio. He’d moved to the city from his native Pennsylvania to attend college, but dropped out to pursue his music career. At Right Track, he’d use the studio’s “downtime” to record his music, still in search of fellow musicians who shared his sensibility.
Continuing to hone his sound, Reznor would attend a gig that would alter his life completely. With Depeche Mode arriving in town on their Black Celebration tour in 1986, Reznor jumped at the chance to see one of his influences.
In 2017, writing in tribute to Depeche Mode for the band’s Facebook page, Reznor recounted the pivotal performance. “It was the summer of ’86. I’d dropped out of college and was living in Cleveland trying to find my way in the local music scene. I knew where I wanted to go with my life, but I didn’t know how to get there,” he recalled. “A group of friends and I drove down to Blossom Music Centre amphitheatre to see the Black Celebration tour. [Depeche Mode] was one of our favourite bands, and the Black Celebration record took my love for them to a new level.”
Depeche Mode’s Black Celebration was born from tensions within the band, as singer Dave Gahan reflected to Bong Magazine, “Sometimes, it seems incredible that we came out of that period with the band and our sanity intact.” Guitarist/keyboardist and songwriter Martin Gore, in turn, honed a darker and heavier sound than their previous works, prioritising a sound that was informal with less emphasis on structure. Resultingly, the album officially transformed Depeche Mode’s image from their “teenybopper” phase to a darker, more subversive brand of alternative rock.
Reznor admits that the fateful performance is a night that he often thinks about, even some 30 years later, “I’ve thought about that night a lot over the years, it was a perfect summer night, and I was in exactly the right place I was supposed to be: the music, the energy, the audience, the connection… it was spiritual and truly magic.”
Beyond Depeche Mode’s captivating performance, the night altered Reznor’s perception of music and, as a result, how he would come to define his own sound. “I left that show grateful, humbled, energised, focused, and in awe of how powerful and transformative music can be… and I started writing what would eventually become Pretty Hate Machine,” he revealed.
“Many times, particularly when we’re playing an amphitheatre,” he concluded, “I’ll think of that show while I’m onstage and hope someone in the audience is in the midst of a perfect summer night feeling how [Depeche Mode] made me feel so many years ago.”
