Wednesday, April 6, 2011

I hardly knew you, Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine

Released on TVT records; Oct. 20, 1989
I'm going on record as saying that "Pretty Hate Machine" is the first of my posts that really makes what I'm doing difficult, and it's not because I'm a die hard NIN fan.  In fact, I have never owned a NIN record.  (I know them almost entirely from radio play.)  The reason this stings is because, though I never purchased this record, we did have a short-lived relationship.

In high school, I worked on a driving range along with my cousin and a third guy.  We worked different shifts, but for the most part our responsibilities were identical; we drove the caged cart that swept the field for golfballs.  On busy days, I'd spend most of my time in the cart listening to my CD walkman, blasting music to drown out the constant CLANGS! and THWOPS! that are inevitable when you're a moving, metal target.

I don't remember if the walkman was communal but there were definitely a handful of CD's that lived in the cart barn.  One of them was PHM and when I'd grow tired of the CD's I'd bring from home, it was typically the next one I'd go for.  In all, I probably listened to this CD 12 times.  And each time, I'd think to myself "I gotta pick this thing up."  But I never did.  It's stupid, but one reason I didn't buy PHM when it came out was because I didn't want to be considered a poser.  (which is especially ridiculous considering that it had already been out for eight years at this point.)

12 plays of a great album is far from satisfying when you think in terms of a twenty year period.  But them's the breaks.  It will just have to serve as a lesson that when music speaks to you, do something about it.  Twenty years can go by like that.  The silver lining is that it's still the only expired NIN record. Trent Reznor's 2nd album "Broken" doesn't expire until September of next year.  Beyond that, there are 6 more studio albums spanning from 1994 to 2008.

Fun fact: I once flew first class (random/unexplained upgrade) from New Orleans to Los Angeles and sat directly across the aisle from Reznor.  He was with his girlfriend.....who was DEAF!  And though there are obvious jokes to be made about Reznor having a deaf girlfriend, I find it extremely fascinating.

No comments:

Post a Comment