Nine Inch Nails Live: Better Than Ever!

Nine Inch Nail - Little Caesars Arena - 08.22.25

I’ve said this on my various social media accounts, and even on this blog, but I wanted to add just a little more and save it for posterity here as well.

I went to see Nine Inch Nail for the fifth time in my life on Friday, August 22; it was visually and musically the best Nine Inch Nails show I have ever been to!

I had seen them twice in the 90s (Detroit, Kalamazoo), and twice in the 00s (Grand Rapids, both times), and now once more in 2025. I saw them in my 20s, in my 30s, and now….well, who cares how old I am now?

While I enjoyed watching Trent Reznor punch out lights and smash keyboards when I was younger, through the years it is clear that he has matured, not only as a person (I mean, he is 60 now), but as an artist as well.

The visuals in 2008 were much better than the ones I had seen 15 years earlier.

But this time?

This was another leap forward.

The way NIN started the show with two piano pieces, adding in artists and instruments during the second song (“Ruiner”) before launching into an all-out aural assault on the main stage, I mean, DAMN!, this was a performance.

And the reworked songs on B-Stage? Holy shit!

I don’t even really like the song “Vessel” (nor most of the Year Zero album), but this version that was reworked with Boys Noize was, as Millenials might say, fucking SICK! Then the way it launches into the updated version of “Closer?”

FUUUUUUUCK!

I was starting to wonder if I was seeing things through the rose-tinted glasses of age, but many others that have been to the shows have come away with the same impression.

Maybe you were there, maybe you agree, maybe you don’t, but all I know is that I was thoroughly impressed and entertained.

Usually a few times at a show I take some pictures or short snippets of video, but I was so engrossed in this concert that I wanted to stay in the now the entire time.

I didn’t snap a single photo or video.

That said, someone did record this lovely memento:

Or, if you’d prefer to listen to it on .FLAC, well, I might know where you can find that as well (it’s here, the link is here).

I don’t know what it is lately about bands in their 60s putting on amazing shows lately (The Pet Shop Boys, Depeche Mode, OMD, NIN…), but I am here for it!