Live: Nine Inch Nails

Nice Inch Nails are really good. I’m fairly convinced of this fact, and I clung to it throughout the night. Like a raft, it bore me from island to island of great songs, scattered haphazardly in a sea of shitty tracks from With Teeth.

To be fair, this is the first time that I’d heard anything off the new album, so I hadn’t really had a chance to get to know any of these dreadful, dreadful songs. They are rubbish, though, when performed live. I can’t imagine that being on record helps them to suck any less.

Of course, no one was there to hear the band play stuff off of With Teeth. Contradict me all you want—you’re lying. About halfway through the set Ninchy Nails realised this and got on with their good songs. And how were they? Well, they were good.

Mostly good. Occasionally things got kicked up into fucking excellent, but never for very long. Somewhere along the way NIN seem to have forgotten how to rock, which is terribly unfortunate. We got a low-calorie, vegan friendly, no-added-goodness version of Burn which simply failed to be heavy enough at the heavy bits. Starfuckers, Inc. suffered from the same problem. Truth be told, it was kind of embarrassing.

Curiously, everything that they played from Broken seemed to escape this fate. Wish was brilliant. Suck was fucking spectacular, easily the highlight of the night. Luckily, NIN retain their understanding of bass drums, and how to make them go. They can still reach right down into the animal part of your brain and give it a fucking good squeeze when they want to. Thanks to this, Hurt and The Day the World Went Away were wheeled out without losing any of the energy which had been built up by March of the Pigs et al.

Reptile made a surprise appearance, and it was lovely. Closer did its usual thing, although it sounded dangerously close to veering off into Down in it at one point. Thankfully, this terrible fate was averted.

The lighting, as per usual, was fantastic. It’s just one of those things that NIN do really well. Towards the end of the gig, one of the interchangeable, non-Treznor members of the band (let’s call him “Danny Lohner”, though it probably wasn’t) started climbing about on all the equipment, before eventually hurling himself into the crowd. The between-songs-banter was practically non-existent, so it was nice to see that the band were enjoying themselves.

A minor disappointment, all in all, but not half as bad as it could have been. Pelting out Hurt with what felt like a million other people is a glorious experience, and I doubt that any other band can whip a crowd up into a sweaty frenzy quite as effectively as these guys. Nine Inch Nails are really good.

[Robb]

Did you whack that out in like 3 minutes? Pretty poor review with one point valid for me (the With Teeth songs being cack, which we all know anyway).

The songs that were meant to be strung out and spine-tingle laden were definetly so (Something I Can Never Have being the first to grab me that way) and the songs that rocked, well FUCKING ROCKED. Greatest gig of my life poorly represented on the internet, WHAT A SURPRISE!

[Potatojunkie]

Originally Posted by idle

the songs that rocked, well FUCKING ROCKED.

Except for the ones that should have and fucking didn't. Come on, it sounded like someone had forgot to plug the fucking guitar in during Starfuckers.

[Robb]

I was too busy rocking out to notice, man.

[Potatojunkie]

Pfft. I still noticed and I was rocking out, like, times five. If rocking out were nickels, I'd have been a quarter.

[Rev Scapegoat]

Great gig - Marred only by some gash interludes... And the FUCKING WANKER who insisted on flailing around, throwing punches into empty space ( Thank fuck ) and jumping up and down during March Of The Pigs.
Fuck off, you drugged-up piece of shit. And if you WEREN'T on something... All the worse.

Oh, and the girl stood in front of me - There's NEVER any need to screech at the top of your lungs, no matter how slippery Trent gets you!

[Syxx]

That was fucking awesome, when Closer turned into The Only Time for 8 bars. I went fucking batshit, to say the least.

[Potatojunkie]

Originally Posted by syxx19

That was fucking awesome, when Closer turned into The Only Time for 8 bars. I went fucking batshit, to say the least.

*clicks fingers*

I knew it was one of the shite tracks off PHM...

[Campestral]

pj. stick to politicks. romance is beauty and never can be understood. trent reznor is a prick. he is like us all though. he makes music like the first beat

[unkle markus]

I liked the start got bored with the middle and enjoyed the end.

That probably sums it up for me in as few words as possible.

[SqueeTDM]

This had to have been the best gig ever, best DAY ever.. Got there at 10am and hung bout with the 7 people in front of us, theyw ere all cool as hell, Hazel, Sean, Clara, James, Danni and Chrissto (sorry for any misspellins if u read this guys) we just chilled all day it was awesome, we made fun of drunks, we laughed so hard at the mobile cctv van.. it was just awesome.. and the band was.. wow.. at the barrier inbetween trent and jordie all night was sweet.. something i can never have was my highlight

[Charlie Parker]

10am? You obviously have no life

[Helter Skelter]

Originally Posted by Potatojunkie

Pfft. I still noticed and I was rocking out, like, times five. If rocking out were nickels, I'd have been a quarter.

I can confirm that you were indeed rocking out. You were right behind me for the vast majority of the gig and if feared for my wellbeing at one point. I was also whipped by your hair on numerous occasions. But appart from that I thought it was excellent.

[Potatojunkie]

Originally Posted by Helter Skelter

You were right behind me for the vast majority of the gig and if feared for my wellbeing at one point. I was also whipped by your hair on numerous occasions.

Sorry, chops. Not just hair but sweaty hair. You should have told me to fuck off, or something.

[heartworm]

Its going to take a long time to get over just how great this concert was