Ah, good for you. I want to go see them next month when they are in my small city. Funny story - I found myself in a social situation with a 21 year old former student. I asked him if Nine Inch Nails was Geezer music, and he politely said, yeah, kinda.

I asked him if Nine Inch Nails was Geezer music, and he politely said, yeah, kinda.

(drinks mint julep, tells kids to get off my lawn)

And that would be the U.S. definition of "geezer" as opposed to the U.K. definition?

Speaking of geezer music...

I was driving to a deposition with my boss, a relatively senior partner at a big law firm. We were both in suits, driving his big black Mercedes, and looked very, very conservative. Some high school kid pulls up next to us at a stop light in his shitty Honda, looks at us, and cranks up 50 Cent on his shitty stock stereo system. My boss takes one look at him, slides Pretty Hate Machine into the cd player, and proceeds to blast Head Like a Hole louder than I've ever heard any music ever played. The look on this kid's face was priceless.

Heh. I bet your boss got off on the "bow down before the one you serve" line.

I saw NIN in Madison a few years ago. Absolutely one of the best shows I've seen, and definitely the best arena show. I didn't have the courage to jump in the pit, though.

Heh, rainbaby. I can't say as that meant there was a shortage of 21-year-olds at the shows, though. My "blurb" review of With Teeth is actually "You have to be turning 40 [like Reznor] to get this album", although "getting sober" might be another choice.

My friend is elevation-challenged, so it's always hard for her to be on the floor. It was only the fact that I was there that made her feel safe enough to get into the mix -- she had a crowd crush experience when she was a teenager (nobody was killed, but a bunch got injured) and sometimes gets panicky. I'm a big guy and finally here's a situation besides football where that's worth something -- I can stand my ground pretty well. I only got knocked off my feet briefly once at the end. I had to do a lot of active pushback, especially because of the doofuses trying to get in front of my friend. One man-mountain I dubbed (in my mind) "Lenny" was even taller than me and his shoulders were a couple inches above my friend's scalp; he seemed impervious to most of the crowd movement (my advantage) but also not really aware of anybody else around him, but eventually she tapped him on the shoulder and asked and he moved off to the side instead of blocking her. He was pretty dough-faced, I'd say very early 20s or even younger.

There was one guy we saw who had a big bloody scar on his face. He seemed too drunk to notice it yet. I don't love my music quite that much.

Lessee ... what else? Oh, I'm never using Google Maps for directions again. They don't list exit numbers and the maps don't print cross streets. I know Milwaukee but we still made a wrong turn and we overshot the arena in Moline for the same reason (plus I would have taken a different route). I'm still weighing whether getting my head bitten off for this hurt more than the crowd-surfer who got dropped on it. ;-)

My friend was meeting up with some of the people from a NIN board she knows (she's a demi-celebrity over there for her wit -- I think she'd fit in fine here but who knows if that will ever happen). One of them was really nice, the others turned out to be nice online personas who were catty in person. She thinks that says something about what they'll be saying about you the next day. She'd also met up with someone for a couple shows earlier that had become a really good online friend in a short time, but the weekend was enough to put the kibosh on that for good, apparently.

At least we had a good time this round. Seems like there will be more opportunities, though, as Reznor mentioned work on a new album and there's an overseas leg after this mini-tour that will be followed by a more traditional return to the US arena circuit.

God, I'm longwinded. Oh, I have a ringing in one ear. I have to wear earplugs at these things from now on.

Sounds like you got to see them in a pretty cool venue. I saw them in Boston and Providence in the last year, and while the shows were awesome, we had *seats* to contend with. Not much dancing happened. Re: age, I'm 26 and I'm probably at the tail end of the NIN fan base...

/26 years on my way to hell...