May Bob have mercy on our dirty little hearts.

Wow. Nobody can discover Nine Inch Nails later than I did.

Not my fave... band? ever ever ever, but I found it like this... Something like this:

~Around friggin 1997 I read an ole entertainment mag featuring a list that was pooooooossibly titled "How to scare grandma away". One of the tips was "Play Nine Inch Nails. Especially the song -" WHAT SONG DID THEY RECOMMEND, if any?! :) Closer, perhaps? Well. I had never heard (of) Nine Inch Nails, but remembered the name for eternity as it gave me a vision of curled, filthy, world-record-long finger nails. Scratching chalkboards and silken skin. Uhu! And seeing how they were recommended in this way, I figured it must be the most evil, badass, noisy band in the universe. Good to know - in 1997 I was concocting a cunning plan on how to scare realtors and would-be buyers from our lovely rental summer house. :) It involved presenting a spotless room to my anxious folks on inspection, and whipping up a post-apocalyptic room to show the buyers 10 minutes later. I made a drawing describing the method. (Display a frightening road sign on the wall, spill substances on the floor, etc.) It was not at all the most exquisite picture ever produced. And it is gone. Somewhere. :C *weep* Hehe, the above wasn't that important. Good times though. (The plan was never realised and the house was sold.) But I wonder if Nine Inch Nails was streaming from the drawing's portable CD player? Maybe not... I knew no lyrics after all. And we listened mostly to E-Type that summer. Badass. How annoying, I SHOULD have checked out Nine Inch Nails that very autumn! XC Once I had read that list it WAS, officially or not, on my list of bands to check out briefly before my death, even though I hardly expected to enjoy... the noise. But there were other artists, more interesting... *shuddering sob*

~2003 brought sweet RICKMANIA. On IMDB:s Alan forum the Snape fans were going and going and going and going and going and going on about some Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails (or so it feels). Aha, that scary band. Well, I suppose I clicked on some picture link to see what I thought about their comparisons between him and Snape. "Maybe a bit." :/ I clicked Back and forgot. Nowadays: "Icarenotifheisamericangobackto1994thento2006-andsmuggletheboyintosnapesworstmemoryscenedammit!"

~In the summer of 2005 I had figured out how to record things from the TV to my beloved DVD recorder, so I kept MTV on and without food or sleep I waited for my fave videos to pop up so that I could make a nice DVD version of old times' MTV tapes. A video I did not care to deev was... (this must have been in 2005, right?) Only by Nine Inch Nails. And that is the only Nine Inch Nails song I remember being played on anything I listened to or watched... :( So I listened. "That doesn't sound like the most badass band in the universe. Sounds kinda normal. Can't get a good look at the pin-creature though." He sounded older than I had imagined. Had I imagined anything? In any case... That was not the worst voice I had heard, I noted in the back of me head and moved on with my life. If only I had not...

~In 2006, I was too busy worrying about something all through the summer job hunting season, maybe that's why I had to make do with the paper gnome mission... :)

~...without which I might not have landed THIS year's district. (And if I had been jolly and normal, I might have found another job.) The paper gnome gets a few papers of her own each day, if she does the job right. On August 7, 2007, I was browsing backwards through the entertainment section of each paper as usual and spotted (in a paper I wouldn't have read but for my gnome job) some boring headline saying... nothing about Nine Inch Nails or the Reznor bloke, but it was an interview with him, I noticed. Thought I'd read it. I did. Wooooooooooo!

Ratexla's diary: "He seems nice and his new record seems cool. I should check. It's called Year zero."
Interviewer, magically calling from the page: "Did you know they're playing in Stockholm tonight?! :D"
Ratexla: "Whatever. Wonder if I'm gonna fall in love with Trent. His singing WAS pretty nice, and here he complains about people who think global warming is a myth. Is it hot in here or is it just Trent?"

I considered the matter for a few days, ordered the CD, survived the death-plunging and returned home to the newly arrived Year zero. Late, so I soon hopped into bed and hit Play.

Year zero: *BOINK BZZZZZZZZZZZ SCREEEEEECH*
Ratexla: "Oh... fuck, the sound of dustbins rolling downhill. It was to be expected. I doubt I can get used to this, but the idea was cool nevertheless, so I had to check. Tomorrow I will read the interesting, inaudible lyrics, prolly put the CD on the shelf forever, or sell it, and be happy for the experience." *CRASH*

The next day I did read all the lyrics and was awaaaaaaake during the last 2 songs - In this twilight and Zero-sum, both of which I liked instantly. :)

Ratexla: "I will at least listen to THESE again!" *goes trentsurfing*
Fan on forum: "I had to listen to Year zero a few times before I could like it..."
Ratexla: "Def more chances for you, little CD..."
Site-owning fan: "Nine Inch Nails is not everyone's cuppa, but if you are meant to be a fan, you will find your way to it..."
Ratexla: "Beautiful."

By nightfall, I didn't find it too bad, even musically, AND I was tolerably high on crush drug. :) After a coupla days, several songs were brain-splattingly listenable. Steel in the night, down the road from Terminator 2... (Oh, today yesterday was the 10th anniversary of the start of THAT war, innit. :O ) Flicking a raven feather to tickle my apocalyptic fancies. When I lie dying of radiation sickness, perhaps I can pull the CD booklet out of my torn, burned pocket and read a little, unless the nuclear blast has skinned me like a cat.

2 days after Year zero I was ready to drill my way through the Himalayas with a toothbrush to go and get the first album. I just took the bus though.

Ratexla: "Severus...?"

2 days later I got the famous The downward spiral, and unless postal service fucks up with The fragile, that's on its way... :) Thereafter I shall no longer be confined to merely standing around record shops, caressing, sniffing, licking, biting, sucking, hugging and ogling With teeth, nooooooo... :9 Damn, now I've hyped it for myself. :p And it will turn out to be one of them things that feature 2 LOVELY HIT SONGS plus x rotting shrimp corpses.

Pleeeeeeeeeeeeease come back to somewhere near me... soon... I must see Nine Inch Nails live before I die. (Or after, if necessary. Though in the latter case I would lack vision.) By still refusing to abbreviate the name I am vainly trying to make up for the partly lost years since I came to know it. :p Not only concerts were missed... During my Trentsurfing I found a group huddled in a forum thread, speaking of how Nine Inch Nails had been like a friend to them in their lives as outcasts. 1997-1998! I was blissfully ignorant of many things that now drive me off 99th floor window ledges... But I was never more... decidedly depressed or... intensely, continuously suicidal. I lived, as you can see. Undiagnosed, not super-serious, got up in the mornings, never fingered razorblades (uh... I had none, and I'd prefer pills), and was probably worried about being so abnormal and ugly and bloke-less, or about my shortage of friends. Friends like Nine Inch Nails? :B