But our lips, but our lips.

You held each other by well-groomed hands, mumbling prayers to a neglected Jesus. The Maître-Des quiver as they watch you shiver as the mask and the mouth knit into each other. Our laughter was deafening but our lips, but our lips, but our lips were trembling.


Putting flowers on The Blood Brothers' grave, so to speak. What an awesome fucking group. I wish I had gotten into them a bit more than 5 months before their breaking up, but here we are. As I rotate through their discography again, I find "Six Nightmares Of The Pinball Masquerade" is my favorite song this time around. 


If I ever find a band that composes lyrics like morbid post modern poetry, if ever find a band that balances two vocalists perfectly, if I ever find a band that balances quivering guitars and tantrum fit drums and a sobbing keyboard, if I ever find a band half as great as The Blood Brothers, you bet your ass I'll love them with everything I have left. 

In Which Sinclair remembers her favorite band of several years;

Recently, I dug out a lot of old Nine Inch Nails. 200ish tracks of Nine Inch Nails, to be particular. Lets talk about this.

Does anyone not know this? (Does anyone read this blog?) Okay, I'll elaborate a tad. I was really, really into Nine Inch Nails. There isn't much more to it. When I was a. . . sophomore, I think, in high school, I bought 'And All That Could Have Been' off eBay because I knew a total of two of their songs; 'Hurt' (I'd never heard the original NIN version, I only knew Johnny Cash's rendition) and 'Closer'. When I got it in the mail, I was actually pretty sad to find out it was a live album. I can't stand live albums*. Regardless, I went through the painful 'getting to know an album' time and came out head over heels in love with this band. The next four years can attest to that. Even though my obsession has run out, I still hold a special, sad little corner of my heart for all that is Nine Inched and Nailed.

(*mostly. Why? Because I'm a terrible person. Though, on Modest Mouses 'Baron Von Bullshit' Isaac Brock goes off about how they'll never play 'Freebird' and it's hilarious. ANYWAY NINE INCH NAILS~)

I might have even flipped out a bit when I found out Trent was getting married and again when I found out Mariqueen was preggo.

Nine Inch Nails isn't about being sad or despondent, it's about a level of aching sadness and unease that, when awash in your own depression, you see being the core of the world. It's about being aware that past a certain point, you're not 'depressed', you're cynical and it's simply your world view; your philosophy. You are immersed in this idea that the skeletal system of everything around you is a varied array of flaws and exploitation of them.

Upon poking around, this is what Trent had to say about The Downward Spiral;

"Thematically I wanted to explore the idea of somebody who systematically throws or uncovers every layer of what he's surrounded with, comfort-wise, from personal relationships to religion to questioning the whole situation. Someone dissecting his own ability to relate to other people or to have anything to believe in."

Sounds about right. People have drug various ideas into trying to figure out the 'concept' of the album, and there's a lengthy writing on how, if memory serves, TDS is about a man becoming god and seeking to destroy himself as a result. S'pretty brilliant.

The great thing about a band being around for 20 years is watching the changes; what stays the same and what doesn't. I was a rabid fan for about 4 of those 20, but it gave me plenty of time to become aquatinted with the material. It's a range of emotion with the same core of loneliness and desperation; whether it be in relation to yourself or the social issues surrounding you.

Sometimes I think about the times I drug my ex to NIN shows and weep for her. Sorry, Miranda.

I spent a lot of rainy days listening to 'Ghosts', I spent a lot of days sitting in my car before work listening to 'The Fragile', a lot of afternoons after school just laying in bed, staring at my ceiling listening to 'The Downward Spiral' and feelings like I understood something I didn't before. Thanks for everything NIN, you'll n'er be forgotten.

Bee tee dub, I got the link and the quote off of the NIN wiki. Check it out at your local library!