#tr0nt reznir

Trent stood out from the crowd. Allegheny College was very conservative and preppy. There was no hipster/indie scene at all. He was pretty much the only person who had a distinctive style. He was like a mod or a new-waver. He used to wear parachute pants, and this was back in the ’80s, that whole MTV era. He looked like he had just stepped out of a video. I approached him one night. We were queueing up for dinner, and I said, “Hi, are you from New York?” And he said, “No, I’m from Mercer, but thanks for the compliment.” That was the beginning of our friendship. Within a day or two, I noticed a flyer for his band, Option 30. They were playing downtown. I gathered a bunch of my girlfriends, we went down to see the band, and I was just instantly blown away. He was so charismatic, and he put on such a great show—it was obvious to me that this kid had a lot of talent. The next day was my birthday, and he showed up at my dorm room with a bunch of Twinkies with candles in them and sang “Happy Birthday,” which I thought was very endearing. It’s hard to imagine Trent Reznor doing something like that, but when I knew him he had a very playful personality. He was a big practical joker. Within a few months, he realized that he wasn’t really connecting and integrating well into collegiate life. For somebody that young—he was only 18—he had a lot going on. He was constantly practicing, tinkering with his electronics—he had one of the first Memorymoogs in America. He was throwing himself into his music to the exclusion of his studies. In the end, he couldn’t keep up with both. Gradually, he extricated himself from campus. While he was gone the following year, he sent me flowers on Valentine’s Day. He dropped in unannounced once, and I’ll never forget this: he had his dad’s sports car and he surprised me, picked me up and whisked me away. We went out on this wild ride with the top down. It was something out of a Tom Cruise movie. When he sent me the first NIN demo I was working at Atlantic Records—this was late 1988—and he and I had stayed in touch a little bit. There was a letter explaining that he had been pitching it to different labels, and much to his surprise, he’d gotten overwhelmingly positive responses. I was impressed with the production quality and the caliber of the songwriting. I was a little bit surprised by the musical direction he’d chosen, because it was a lot more aggressive, edgier than anything he’d done before. But to me, it was unquestionable that he would be successful. I remember my boss said to me, “Could you please see if you can get your old boyfriend in here for a meeting?” By the time we got to the party, he had already signed with TVT. When we were doing CMJ—this was probably ’89—they were setting up Pretty Hate Machine. I remember going to the China Club in Manhattan to see him perform. There was this palpable level of excitement and anticipation about that release.

Trent Reznor Era Summaries