Born Michael Trent
Reznor in Mercer, Pennsylvania, he began studying piano when he
was five years old. His parents divorced that same year, and
Reznor was raised by his maternal grandparents. Along with piano,
he also learned to play saxophone and tuba, and, like so many
other fledgling musicians, he sublimated his outsider neurosis in
a band, Option 30. After studying computer engineering at Allegheny College, Reznor moved to Cleveland, where he played in a succession of groups, including Problems, which achieved small-time fame by performing "True Love Ways" in the 1987 Michael J. Fox-Joan Jett film Light of Day. But Reznor was looking for something more adventurous than Problems' meat-and-potatoes hard rock, and by the summer of 1988 he had "formed" Nine Inch Nails to explore strains of dance music, and the burgeoning industrial and techno scenes. Reznor did nearly all of the writing, performing, and producing himself; besides drummer Chris Vrenna, Reznor brought in other musicians only when needed or to tour.
NIN's first effort,
Industrial Nation, ignited a buzz that earned Reznor gigs
supporting Skinny Puppy, the Jesus & Mary Chain, and Peter
Murphy. But it was 1990's Pretty Hate Machine and its hit
"Head Like a Hole," that gave Nine Inch Nails its
commercial foothold; with an evocative blend of industrial
sonics, pop conventions, heavy-metal aggression, and dance-club
rhythms, the album stayed on the Billboard charts for more than
two years. NIN was also the top T-shirt-seller on the first
Lollapalooza tour in 1991. The next Nine Inch Nails release was held up in a legal battle with the band's record label at the time, TVT. Nevertheless, Reznor and manager John Malm formed their own label, Nothing Records, during 1992, and began signing bands, including Pop Will Eat Itself, Prick, and, most notably, Marilyn Manson. NIN did release an EP, Broken, during the fall of 1992, which earned Reznor his first Grammy, as "Wish" won the award for Best Metal Performance. Reznor, TVT, and Interscope (which had signed a deal to distribute the Nothing label) eventually came to an agreement that allowed Reznor and Nothing to move on while TVT retained a financial interest in future NIN albums.
The spring 1994 release of NIN's
second album, The Downward Spiral, marked Reznor's ascension from
the underground into the pop mainstream. The album, recorded in
the Los Angeles house where Charles Manson's minions murdered
actress Sharon Tate, debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard charts.
(Reznor and Tori Amos also recorded her song "Past the
Mission" during the same sessions.) Reznor wound up on the
cover of Rolling Stone and on Playgirl's list of rock's ten
sexiest stars. David Letterman invoked the group's name almost
every night for a week after its mud-splattered,
festival-stealing appearance at Woodstock '94. Pretty happy times
for a guy whose pop mantra is "I focus on the pain/ The only
thing that's real." "Although we've become a fairly big
band, it's been done outside the channels of the mainstream
media," Reznor said. "I really feel like I've done
things on my own terms." Reznor followed The Downward Spiral by producing the imaginative soundtrack for Oliver Stone's controversial film Natural Born Killers, weaving songs (including the NIN tracks "Something I Can Never Have" and "Burn") and dialogue from the film into a seamless, flowing, and disturbing sound pastiche. Around the same time, Reznor also had a brief affair with Hole frontwoman and Kurt Cobain's widow Courtney Love. In 1995, Nine Inch Nails released the re-mix album Further Down the Spiral and toured with David Bowie, one of Reznor's chief
influences. In 1996,
the NIN song "Happiness in Slavery" (the live version
from the Woodstock '94 album) won NIN another Grammy for Best
Metal Performance. At year's end, Reznor was working on the next
Nine Inch Nails album as well three new songs for the soundtrack
to David Lynch's film Lost Highway. Reznor and Lynch shared the
cover of Rolling Stone in February of 1997.