NINtastic Journey.

In honor of the last Wave Goodbye show, I put this together:

It was late June 2009.
Must’ve been around the 18th or 19th, right after I came back from Washington, DC. I was sitting on my bed, legs crossed, listening to my iPod.
It was a month or so too late, but I scrolled through the artists. L…M…N…N! I quickly rolled down until the artist “Nine Inch Nails” was selected.
I opened the album Further Down the Spiral, having been recommended The Downward Spiral but thinking that it would be good enough. I put it on shuffle.
The first song that came on was “The Art of Self Destruction, Pt. 1” a remix of the song “Mr. Self Destruct.”
Quiet beats.
“I control you…I control you…”
Honestly, the song scared me at first. On the chatroom that I was logged into, I typed something along the lines of: “god, does this song scare me. All it basically is is Trent whispering “I control you”! but I love it.”
Soon afterwards, I logged on to the Nine Inch Nails MySpace page. I listened to The Downward Spiral.
“Mr. Self Destruct” was immediately my favorite NIN song.
A bit later, I burned With Teeth to a disc and put it in my CD player. I loved “All the Love in the World,” “The Collector,” “Getting Smaller,” and “Right Where It Belongs.”
Then came The Slip. I got my free download. I loved it.
Skip ahead to the last day of summer -- August 9th, 2009 -- and I was sitting on my bed, drinking a smoothie and finally listening to The Fragile. I loved it instantly, too.
Then I listened to the Broken EP. Didn’t regret it one bit.
My friend, Kera, emailed me her rip of Pretty Hate Machine which I absolutely adored.

And since then, I haven’t looked back.

bow down before the one you serve

AFI lyrics often remind me of Nine Inch Nails lyrics.

"hurt myself today" is a lyric in The Last Kiss (AFI) and Hurt (NIN)
"Hurt myself today -- it's all for you." -- The Last Kiss
"I hurt myself today to see if I still feel..." -- Hurt

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The AFI title "I Am Trying Very Hard To Be Here" reminds me of "I'm Looking Forward To Joining You, Finally"

*

AND MISS MURDER. HOLY HELL.

"beauty will last when spiraled down" is totally a Downward Spiral reference.
I feel that the whole song is sorta a continuation of TDS...

"Hey, Miss Murder can I?
Hey, Miss Murder can I?
Make beuaty stay if I
Take my life?"
This is from the perspective of the character who narrates The Downward Spiral. 'Miss Murder' is another name for his girlfriend (the subject of Piggy, Closer, ad probably Eraser) who he had used for control through sex, who left him. He's asking her if he can make up for his sins if he takes his life, for at the point of the song "The Downward Spiral" (penultimate track) he realized how badly he's screwed up and commits suicide in that song.

"With just a look
They shook
And heavens bowed before him
Simply a look
Can break
Your heart..."
This is a reference to the tyrannical "God" figure the character overthrows then becomes (Heresy, Ruiner, Big Man With A Gun, etc...).

"The stars that pierce the sky
He left them all behind
We're left to wonder why
He left us all behind."
Pretty obvious, about his suicide.

"Dreams of his crash
Won't pass
Oh, how they all adored him
Beauty will last
When spiraled
Down."
Basically very obvious. People loved him, he couldn't see it, he threw it all away.

"The stars that mystified
He left them all behind
And how his children cried
He left us all behind."
Same thing as the first part of this verse and the last part of the first verse.

"What's the hook, the twist
Within this verbose mystery?"
"verbose mystery" could be a reference to the album itself.

"I would gladly bet my life upon it
That the ghost you love
Your ray of light will fizzle out
Without hope..."
This is about the relationship he had with his girlfriend, Miss Murder or the piggy. Also may be a reference to Ghosts I-IV

"We're the empty set
Just floating through
Wrapped in skin
Ever searching for what we were promised
Reaching for that golden ring
We'd never let go
Who would ever let us put their filthy hands upon it?"
This is from the character's point of view once more. "We're" is possibly talking about the song Reptile, "wrapped in skin" means they have no souls. The "golden ring" is power, something he was aiming for in the beginning, power, control, self-identity. Their hands are filthy from what they have become.

We return to the chorus, his pleas to Miss Murder or the piggy for an answer. Yet, in the end, he still commits suicide. His downward spiral ends.