I don't often make off-topic posts but...this is something really special to me and I wanted to publicly celebrate the occurrence - just a nice ray of fandom sunshine, so to speak.
Over 20 years ago, I joined an online community devoted to Nine Inch Nails - one of the earliest-known groups, in fact - called Perfect Isolation (a phrase which came to be associated with NIN but also a phrase Trent Reznor lifted from the Pink Floyd song "Waiting for the Worms" because The Wall is one of his all-time inspirations). And for the next 15 years or so I was a loyal member of that online family containing people from all around the world, one of the most inclusive online groups I've ever been a part of, which speaks as much to the nature of Trent's universal appeal as it does to the way the Internet can be either an echo chamber or a place which positively expands your mind. In both online and outside life we experienced meet-ups, successes, scandals, fights, sockpuppets, marriages, kids...just about anything you can imagine which can happen to a particular group of people who band together in an intentional community. We weren't interested in being the best-known or the biggest fan community - we left that to Echoing The Sound - we were more about being a family. A very weird sort of family, but that was the depth of our affection for each other. Not everyone really "got" the vibe, but if you did, then you would always be welcomed. We were fans of NIN, but we were also fans of each other.
And we also had a guy from New Zealand join (under the username HaloNineteen if I recall correctly) who became our virtual kid brother and then grew up to become a television journalist and filmmaker and then today...it all comes back around again as David led an online panel discussion with Trent and his ongoing collaborator Atticus Ross, plus current and former collaborators and members of the Nine Inch Nails touring band upon the occasion of Nine Inch Nails' induction to the Rock&Roll Hall of Fame, class of 2020.
with thanks to Gosia Rost for the screencap from YouTube
And it couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. I can't fully express how proud I am to see David not only having won the respect of one of his all-time favorite musicians, but also witnessing the professionalism and personableness which he has exhibited throughout his career.
Our PI enclave has scattered to the wind a bit (though we can find each other when we need to) and the online forum as it once was is no more, but the spirit of our community, our family, lives on because the love of music is something which can always build connections - and if you're lucky - for a lifetime.
