Live Concert Review: NIN at the Toyota Center in Houston
Since letting his contract with Warner expire, Reznor has become an independent artist, a status that allowed him the luxury of releasing a free album, The Slip, for download on his website this year. Cynics pointed out that the album, besides not being very good, was merely a marketing gimmick to promote the inevitable world tour. While there’s certainly some truth in that, how many other millionaire musicians have given anything away, ever?
I’m one of the few people in my social circle who have any opinion about NIN whatsoever, so when I got offered tickets to the show in Houston last Saturday, I figured it would be worth the drive. I had an extra ticket and briefly flirted with the idea of taking my mom, but she had a bridge date next door which was probably just as well. This being Houston, I got lost downtown and spent half an hour futilely trying to pay $15 to park in a garage (cash or check only, wtf). I somehow found a free spot on the street, 100 feet from the arena, and walked in on the last five minutes of openers A Place To Bury Strangers’ set, hearing just enough of their amorphous feedback fade-out to know I’d missed something very loud.
For those of you who haven’t been to a big rock show at a corporate arena in awhile, not much has changed: beer still costs four times what you’d pay anywhere else and you are guaranteed to find yourself trapped next to at least one extremely irritating person. So it was at Houston’s Toyota Center, home of the Rockets, last Saturday, where Reznor and a half-dozen semi trucks rolled in for the Lights In The Sky Across North America Tour 2008. There was a distressingly large number of soccer moms and dads in my seating section--we're talking pleated denim shorts, flowered golf shirts, the works--filling out the stands, apparently while their brood milled about down by the stage. “You see what them girls was wearing?” said Dad 1 to Dad 2 as they took their seats next to me. At least they were acting their age. The mid- to late-thirtysomethings wearing decades-old Downward Spiral t shirts were out in force; while it was nice to see hardcore fans getting into it, the fishnet arm-stockings and Doc Martens didn’t do much to flatter the receding hairlines and expanding paunches.
After the lights went down, drummer Josh Freese appeared onstage with about a thousand watts of light blasting from behind his kit, creating an eerie silhouette as he pounded out the intro to "1000000." Looking buff and compact in a blue button-down and leather pants, Reznor wasted no time taking possession of the stage, appearing from behind the drum riser with a nifty sideways crab-hop and throwing the mic stand halfway across the stage, an act that must feel as natural to him as brushing his teeth. (Dad 1 to Dad 2: “Who is this character anyway?”) The first three tunes were pulled from The Slip, and while the crowd reacted enthusiastically it felt like they were patiently waiting for their blast of nostalgia, which came in due course with the off-kilter chestnut "March Of The Pigs."
One key to the longevity of NIN: no matter how old the song, no matter how many times they’ve heard it before, fans still lost their shit for the classics. "March" was followed by "Closer," which judging by the audience reaction may has well have been Cher’s “Do You Believe In Love.” It’s no secret that cultural assimilation has leeched the NIN catalog of virtually all threat, but for those of us who remember conservative windbag George Will denouncing “Closer” in the pages of Newsweek, it was quite amusing to watch a pack of soccer moms air-clapping along to the chorus.
Alas, some folks never got the memo. As the band lit into their metallic Grammy-winner “Wish,” the standing room in front of the stage was disturbed by a half-dozen gorillas whose mosh-trigger had just been tripped. From then on, every time the guitars revved up these lunkheads would initiate awkward shoving matches in successively lamer and more desperate attempts to start a "pit." Save it for the football field, guys. The moshers had absolutely no idea what to do during the recital of material from this year’s ambient experiment Ghosts I-IV, during which Reznor tackled a set of marimbas (!), bassist Justin Meldal-Johnsen plucked an upright bass, and guitarist Robin Fincke blew on some kind of giant panpipe. Watching those poor souls struggling to reconcile the twenty-odd minutes of New Age noodling with their memories of road-raging to “March Of The Pigs” was alone worth the price of admission.
For me, the Ghosts material leaned a little heavily on texture and atmospherics, at the expense of dynamics and melody, but it was a refreshing break from the pummeling that preceded it and also featured some of the most beautiful lighting arrangements of the night. The Ghosts set segued nicely into a low-key, mandolin-led rendition of "Piggy," and from there it was back off to the races.
The crack band raced through each tune as if they’d been playing them for years, impressive considering that, except for guitarist Fincke (who played with Reznor as early as 1994), the players are mostly NINovices. Keyboardist Allessandro Cortini (who contributed to Ghosts) and Meldal-Johnsen (of Beck fame) just came on board this year, while session powerhouse Freese has been playing with NIN since 2005. It should be noted that every song featured companion visuals powered by one of the most intense lighting set-ups I’ve ever seen, featuring no less than three movie-sized LCD screens blasting nuclear-powered animations that lit up every corner of the arena. “Lights In The Sky” has to be one of the most ambitious shows ever staged by an independent artist, and for that Reznor deserves kudos. So, altogether a classy program. Just stay out of the pit.
