Oh my damn where have I been?

Nine Inch Nails, "We're in this together now"

On: The Fragile (1999)

A bit of a back story...I'm pretty sure that I bought The Fragile so that I had something to talk about with the goth chicks in my high school gym class (they were so cool! I was so not!). I think I listened to it once to get the gist of the album--which at the time I thought was simply loud noises and screaming--and then immediately went back to listening to Silverchair (don't judge me). I guess it took me a a decade to catch up, because I f-ing love this album now, namely the title track and "We're in this together now."

Why this song surprised me...I was in fourth grade when I first heard of NIN, and like most people is was because Trent Reznor was screaming through my stereo speakers that he wanted to f*ck me like an animal. Since it's kind of difficult for a nine-year-old to appreciate the poetry in that, I never really thought much of the band lyrically. Shortly after I bought The Fragile, I bought the Lost Highway soundtrack, to which Reznor contributed largely. The combination of the two made me a fan of NIN's beats, however, if you held a gun to my head, I still couldn't sing along to any of the songs. It's wasn't until about a month ago that I broke out The Fragile again and, well, actually listened to the words behind the screaming...and I was pretty impressed. "We're in this together now" stuck out for me because it had a (non-carnal/sexual) lyrical intensity that I wasn't expected. There is no shock value...it's just a damn good love song.

Best lyric: "The farther I fall, I'm beside you/As lost as I get I will find you/The deeper the wound I'm inside you/For ever and ever I am a part of/You and me, We're in this together now..."