As one of the most influential and powerful bands of the 1990s, Nine Inch Nails and its leader Trent Reznor had changed the face of rock music by bringing industrial rock to the mainstream. With grunge rock leading the charge of the early 90s, Reznor and his cohorts provided the alternative by bringing in heavy and pulsating synthesizers, catchy pop hooks, grinding guitar riffs, loud drums, and bleak lyrics that helped their 1994 album “The Downward Spiral” to be one of the most popular albums of the 1990s while their 1989 landmark debut “Pretty Hate Machine” redefined the possibilities of industrial music. While their commercial clout has declined in the late 90s, they remained one of rock’s most adventurous and darkest bands as they are now working on their new project. In 1997 as NIN was working on their third album “The Fragile”, music writer Martin Huxley released an unauthorized biography on the band and leader Trent Reznor that is simply-titled “Nine Inch Nails”.

During the “Spiral” era where NIN was in its peak, two books were released as a way to cash in the band’s fame yet they weren’t very spectacular or as carefully researched through various mistakes on details and stories concerning Reznor. In 1997, Huxley’s book finally corrected the mistakes and thoroughly researched the band through various news articles and television programs along with a well-in depth research through Reznor’s background. Nine Inch Nails is mainly the story of Trent Reznor, who is the mastermind behind the group who had seen through various members in its existence. The book goes into full detail about the NIN story from Reznor’s early years to the band’s post-“Spiral” period in 1996. While fans who have been keeping up with Reznor’s activity in the past five years, Huxley’s book is pretty dated and doesn’t have enough information concerning the post-“Spiral” period for NIN. Despite that flaw, Martin Huxley’s book is by far the best biography on NIN and it’s still the only available at this moment.

The first chapter of the book begins with Michael Trent Reznor’s birth on May 17, 1965 in Mercer, Pennsylvania to the parents of Michael Reznor Sr., a commercial artist and interior designer who is also a bluegrass musician, and Nancy Clark, a housewife. In 1971 shortly after the birth of his sister Tera, Trent Reznor’s parents divorced as he was sent to live with his maternal grandparents, Bill and Clara Clark while his mother lived nearby with Tera. Huxley went through a very good research including an old 1990 article from the alternative rock magazine Alternative Press where Reznor talked about his downtrodden existence that plagued Reznor and several Alt-rock icons and peers who all had similar backgrounds. While he lived happily at home with his grandparents where he enjoyed skateboarding, fishing, and particularly, playing the family piano, he also had several allergies ranging from cats, dust, and ragweed that alienated him as a child when he comes across young school kids.

As a way to cope with his alienation, Reznor played the piano and studied saxophone and trumpet where by his early years; he had the potential to become a classical piano prodigy. By his teens, he was in the school band playing tenor sax and in was also popular in the school theater where played Judas in the production of “Jesus Christ Superstar”. He was also fascinated by sci-fi including his favorite TV show, “The Six Million Dollar Man”, and the rock music of bands like Kiss, Pink Floyd, and David Bowie. Reznor threw away his classical aspirations for guitars and synthesizers as he went to Allegheny College in Pennsylvania where he studied computer engineering for a year while moonlighting in bands as a keyboard player.

By the mid-80s, Reznor left Pennsylvania for Cleveland where he worked at music store selling sequencers and synthesizers and played in various bands like the Innocents and Lucky Pierre with friend and future Nothing Records protégé Kevin McMahon of Prick. After that, he played in the Exotic Birds with future Stabbing Westward drummer Andy Kubiszewski and an old high school friend Chris Vrenna. Vrenna and Reznor joined forces, lived in an apartment and got into the vibrant industrial music of bands like Ministry, Skinny Puppy, Front 242, Einstruzende Neubauten, and Throbbing Gristle. In 1987, Reznor landed a small role in the movie “Light of Day” with Michael J. Fox and Joan Jett where played a keyboard player in a synth-pop band called the Problems (they sucked, by the way).

After leaving the Exotic Birds, Reznor and Vrenna decided form their own project as Reznor began to write his own songs. After meeting up with local manager John Malm Jr. Reznor decided to call his new project Nine Inch Nails with Vrenna as an assistant. After handing out demos to several labels, Reznor got an offer from TVT and signed with label without much thought. He went to work on the debut “Pretty Hate Machine” with producers Flood, Keith LeBlanc, and Adrian Sherwood where he crafted one of the best debuts in the 1980s. Mixing industrial rock with catchy pop hooks and introspective songwriting, “Pretty Hate Machine” was a landmark album but upon its release, it was released to a lot of obscurity as rock fans were thriving on Guns N’ Roses and the hair bands.

As the book reaches through chapters four through eight, Huxley chronicles the era of the making of “Pretty Hate Machine” along with the infamous “Down In It” video that caught the attention of the FBI over some footage that Reznor and filmmakers thought was destroyed during the making of the video. What wasn’t mentioned in the book and probably through Huxley’s knowledge was the first television appearance for NIN which was on the cheesy 80s dance show Dance Party USA where NIN that consisted of Reznor, Vrenna, future Filter leader Richard Patrick (brother of “Terminator 2” star Robert), and keyboardist Ben Rushe that was revealed in 1999 for a Rolling Stone cover story by Anthony Bozza. After various keyboardists before settling with James Wooley, NIN opened for the Jesus & Mary Chain and Peter Murphy and blowing them away.

By the time NIN landed a slot on the inaugural Lollapalooza festival with Jane’s Addiction, buzz circulated on NIN as their album was steadily growing in album sales and by the time they played the Lollapalooza festival, they stole the show. After two years of nonstop touring and promotion, “Pretty Hate Machine” went platinum becoming the very first industrial rock album to do so. While the success was great, things weren’t going well when NIN was having trouble with TVT Records over projects outside of the label and Reznor sued the label and wanted out of its contract. He then went on a short European tour with Guns N’ Roses while he was fighting suit as Interscope Records decided to buy TVT in order to acquire NIN. Reznor at first didn’t like the deal until Interscope founder Jimmy Iovine decided to give him his own label, Nothing Records.

In late 1992, NIN released the EP “Broken” to rave reviews and to everyone’s surprise, reached the Billboard top ten albums charts and won a Grammy for Best Metal Performance. In 1993, NIN began work on “The Downward Spiral” but Trent Reznor suffered a huge case of writer’s block as they were making the album in the old house where the Charles Manson family killed Sharon Tate. Reznor was also making the debut album for protégé and shock rocker, Marilyn Manson. During the early sessions for “Spiral”, NIN touring guitarist Richard Patrick quit as he went on to form Filter, which was explained later on in the book.

Later chapters chronicle the making and the release of “The Downward Spiral” where NIN received the most attention after stealing the show from hundreds of bands and performer at the 25th Anniversary Edition of Woodstock in 1994 where NIN was covered in mud and made 300,000 people go wild. Reznor by then was a star and he produced the acclaimed soundtrack to the Oliver Stone movie “Natural Born Killers” and went on tour relentlessly. What Martin Huxley didn’t mention during that period was some of the infamous groupies stories NIN had done during the tour that was later revealed in 1998 from a bio by Marilyn Manson that explained the debauchery in gory detail which was exaggerated by the shock rocker and by several magazines.

One mistake Huxley did make was concerning the remix EP “Further Down The Spiral” where he said a sample of the David Bowie song “Time” appeared in the track for “The Art Of Self Destruction, Part Three” but to correct him, it was actually “Part Two” but it’s just a minor mistake so I won’t hold that against him. The sampled he mentioned was part of a chapter concerning the tour NIN did in late 1995 opening for Bowie that drew huge acclaim as it restored some luster for the pop legend and won some respectability for NIN. As Huxley reached into 1996, not much information happened except for Reznor making the Manson album “Antichrist Superstar” and a brief mention of Chris Vrenna playing for the Smashing Pumpkins at the Grammy Awards in 1997 that at first, wasn’t clear if he had departed until Reznor told Alternative Press in late '97.

While the book has a lot of good info and everything, it doesn’t really offer anything new other than his early years and background. Plus, since its release in mid-97, a lot has happened since for NIN along with some stories during the post-“Spiral” period. For someone new to the band, this is by far the best book on Nine Inch Nails and it’s so far, the only one that has any good information. Unfortunately by the time they reached the end of the book, they want to know what happened since then. Well, that’s easy. Go to my several Fragility columns at Epinions for that since I have kept up with the NIN news. Buy Huxley’s book for the band’s period from the early years to 1996, go to my columns for the later stuff. Hopefully, I will be the one to update the NIN history very soon.


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