No casual fans were in attendance.  Because you couldn’t get a ticket.  And why would you want to?

At the juncture of art and commerce, for one slim moment in the nineties, an act playing less than mainstream music could make a video so riveting, enhancing the underlying sounds, that MTV could air it and a career could be jettisoned from nowhere into the stratosphere.

This was prior to Facebook, BlackBerry Messenger.  There were pockets of fans, but MTV blew Nine Inch Nails up. And then Trent and his roving band of backup musicians blew people’s minds.  Most notably at a Woodstock reunion, where turf was thrown and there was a palpable excitement not seen since the sixties.  This was a scene.  Which David Letterman wanted a part of.  But Nine Inch Nails never did do his show.  Why?  Dave could look hip, but what would it do for the band?  Who’d already reached many more people than they’d originally anticipated.  Who would seem positively small on television.  Whereas their music was so big!

You wouldn’t drop the needle on a NIN album at a party, certainly not a club, unless it was inhabited by misfits, who felt the mainstream had rejected them.  But now, the mainstream barely exists.  Instead of being an outsider, Trent Reznor is a leader, a beacon, telling all in attendance, all paying attention, to do it your own way.

Imagine being in a relationship where you never had to compromise, where you were loved for the way you are.  A job where you could tell off the boss.  This world doesn’t exist, except in art.  That’s the privilege of the artist, an ability to create in his own exact vision.  A charge which Trent Reznor embodies, blazing a path in his own unique direction, willing to make mistakes along the way, worried not a whit what some overlord might think.

And what results is music made for few.  But these few, they adore him.  For expressing all their frustration, for being who they want to be, uncompromised.

Just before the houselights went down, Tony Hawk came over to say hi to Jim.  Guerinot told me he’d learned tons from working with the skateboard king.  In the music business we sucked at the tit of the label, we were beholden to the company to both make us and direct us.  Whereas Tony had had to cobble it together himself.  Take chances. Tony was what the music business became.  Sure, he ultimately got lucky with his video game, but its success was not foreseen.  Tony’s an artist, not only on four wheels, but in business, willing to take chances, to do it a different way, only by taking risks can you get a surprising result.

The audience was not pretty.  These were not scenesters.  I saw so much black, you’d think we were at a wake. Which, on one hand, we were, the final NIN performance.  But so many of these people believe they’re at a permanent wake, that the odds are stacked against them, they look to the music for a release.

And there was tons of music.  Three encores and thirty nine songs.

Things started to heat up twelve numbers in.  When Mike Garson took the stage.

Shouldn’t it have been Benmont Tench?  No, diss to Mr. Heartbreaker, but when you’re in Los Angeles, your special guests are Hollywood stars, not an avant garde pianist whose one fling with the mainstream was thirty odd years ago on David Bowie’s "Aladdin Sane".

But Mike added a new element.  Prior to this, the music had been an assault.  Suddenly, it had texture, mood.

Then came Gary Numan.  Yup, the guy with the slick ‘do who sang "Cars".  But although a novelty on MTV, a one hit wonder, Mr. Numan was not in it for the fame, but the sound.  Trent considers him to be a progenitor.  Gary, looking little less for wear, not having gone under the surgeon’s knife, but having been hermetically sealed in a basement, continuing to play music, stood at the mic with authority and dealt out the lyrics.  Then tapped on a keyboard at the front of the stage.  In this world, Les Pauls and synthesizers co-exist.

Encore one featured Atticus Ross and Dave Navarro.

Encore two was performed with the Dillinger Escape Plan.  An act I’d never heard of, but I’ll never forget.  A complete band, a NIN doppelganger, who took the stage with such energy that you could feel it blasting in your face.  The drummer pounded, then they kicked around his big bass drum, threw it in the air.  The guitarist twirled his guitar around his body, again and again.  And the lead singer jumped into the audience.  Rick Mueller said it was the most exciting act he’d seen all year, Jim said he wanted to see them again.  All I’ll say is they got my attention!

The final six song encore was more melodic.  It’s like after beating you in the head, taking you on an aural mystery tour, Trent wanted to soothe you, let you know it was going to be all right, that he’d be back.

And he will.  Or so he said.

So, I believe you’ll get another chance to experience mindblowing staging.  Supposedly stripped down, the flashing lights, the strobes, created an otherworldly atmosphere.  Like the sixties, but even darker.  Like the survivors of Altamont regrouped and started making their own music.

Will you get another chance to hear this band?  The drummer who never let up, who pounded like Keith Moon, albeit harder and slower?  Robin Finck?  The bass player who could manipulate a double acoustic in addition to his electric?

I’m not sure.  But whatever concoction he comes up with, we’ll be interested.  Because Trent Reznor is a true artist. Testing limits, doing it his way.  Watching him perform, all the executives got small, retreated in the distance.  Although singular, not leading any mass charge, Trent is doing it for us.  Illustrating that you can do it your way and not only survive, but thrive.  I’m not telling you to buy an album, download a track.  I’m just saying when you watch acts develop in the future and wonder where they got their ideas, look to people like Trent Reznor and Radiohead.  It’s not about making music that sounds like theirs, but coming from the same place.  That the art is king.  And that NO ONE is going to tell them what to do!