autolycus

NIN: The Downward Spiral
- or -
Notes from my Breakdown

I was browsing through some old record reviews I had written when I came across this little monster. It was written just after a time of personal crisis. It seemed altogether fitting to review the Nine Inch Nails "The Downward Spiral" through the filter of someone (yours truly) in intense pain. I'm happy to report that all is well now, but back then - well, here's what I wrote...

i am the voice inside your head - and i control you. So began my plunge into the abyss. It started with an exploratory step to see what was beyond the cliff, but I lost my footing and tumbled towards the bottom helpless, frantically clutching for bits of undergrowth which slipped through my fingers. . i am the hate you try to hide. i take you where you want to go. i give you all you need to know. i drag you down i use you up. mr self destruct. The monster gears were churning and I could smell ozone from the sparks sizzling in my tortured mind, but I could do nothing to stop the descent; my heart dragging my rational being towards misery. . nothing can stop me now. i dont care anymore. A love was born of innocence and playfulness, but mutated into hopeless, impossible, deviantly painful passion for someone I could not have. Should not have. And I would have sold my soul to make it real, to satisfy the all-consuming hunger as my seed spurted into my hand. i want to fuck you like an animal. i want to feel you on the inside. I yearned to make it real, grabbing concrete moments of communion with an impossible love, an unholy love, wrapped up in a fantasy that seemed so real, that it became real even if it was only in my mind. I couldnt let it slip away. you didnt hurt me, nothing can hurt me. you didnt hurt me, nothing can stop me now. The descent continued, the few remnants of what I used to be screaming out, gasping for breath with futility. When I finally gave in and surrendered to the noise and confusion, it felt right. I was at peace with my decadent passion for Life. It was a warm place with the Me I had denied all these years.

And then I lost even that, the fragile dreamspace smashed into a pulp of gleaming tissue and body fluid. My reality crumbled to be replaced with - - - - -. emptiness.

need you. dream you. find you. taste you. fuck you.

It was raining outside. Alone in the dark house. Acute pain. A wounded, braying organism, pounding fists against the stairs, tasting tears, I screamed Fuck you, God! at the top of my lungs - Fuck you, God! Fuck you!!!!! - because God was a fucker for letting this happen if indeed He did exist. I didnt care if the neighbors heard, screaming FUCK YOU GOD until I was hoarse and my knuckles were bleeding and I was incapacitated by violent sobs, curling into a fetal position, impotent. lose me. hate me. smash me. erase me. Caught in the teeth of pounding machinery, wincing from the stinging smell of sulfur and hot oil. I had destroyed everything, including the One the forbidden One - I loved. devils speak of the ways in which shell manifest, angels bleed from the tainted touch of my caress.

And when I thought it couldnt get any worse, I was ripped from my community, thrust into shameful exile without any further hope of communication with Her. Surrounded by fog, there were only brief moments of clarity: I found myself sitting by the river, chain-smoking cigarettes, wondering if life was worth continuing. you could have it all - my empire of dirt. i will let you down. i will make you hurt. if i could start again a million miles away, i would keep myself. i would find a way. At last at the bottom of the spiral, every bone splintered, a smashed lump of once living flesh, I was dead, devoid of feeling even the pain.

Nothingness at the bottom of the spiral, my descent into Hell complete.