INTO THE WILD part 1 page 1

TRUE BLOOD fans, please stay frosty. I promise I will post something. My post is in the middle of revisions right now. But I hope you enjoyed the first episode! I watched it after Entourage (which, like most men is over way to quickly) and was stunned by how long it was. TRUE BLOOD is a LOT of television.

But... I met Tim Kring at the Nine Inch Nails concert.

WTF?!!!

Alright, it all starts with James Martin, co-writer of Into the Wild and Tim Kring's assistant. We needed a bunch of last minute sign offs from the writers so I asked him and Timm Keppler if they were available over the weekend via email. James mentioned he was available all weekend except for the Nine Inch Nails concert he was going to Saturday night. I jumped out of my seat. I was going too! We organised to meet up. How cool is that?

Let's wind forward to Saturday.

Mathew Perry is standing in my driveway smoking a cigarette. I'm not a huge Friends fan so I give him "the nod" and head to my car. You know "the nod". He knows I know who he is. I know he knows I know who he is. But he knows I'm too damn cool to make an ass of myself knowing who he is.

I'm actually not that cool. But I have to act the way I was dressed, and given that I was about as rock star as I was gonna get, that's a fair act to live up to. My hair was perfect and the outfit tastefully excessive.

Getting to the forum was pretty easy and funny. People kept pulling up next to each other at each set of lights asking for directions, so I did the same. It was like some sort of directionless communal caravan running on faith and over-priced gas.

So I get to the forum and pull into the parking lot. I'm borrowing a friend's car so I get out to check my park and confirming that it too was excellent I get back in my car to get all my stuff. Well, I try to. The door had locked behind me and the car was still on. Brilliant. Just brilliant. Here all week folks, enjoy the veal and tip your waitress. Champagne comedy.

So I could've been hanging with James and his awesome friend Rick, but no, I'm waiting for AAA. They're pretty good and take only 20 minutes. Soon, keys back in hand I head into the venue. I call James and ask him where he's sitting. He tells me it's kind've complicated and he will come to me. Hooo-kay. I tell him and Rick and James find me. It was like meeting old friends. We had such a great chat. I really enjoyed chatting to them and they can both expect to be stalked by me in the future for more social action.

But what's with this "complicated" thing? "Where are you sitting?" I ask.

James tells me that he actually has a vip all areas pass. "How the hell did you get that?!" I exclaim.

James tells me that Tim (Kring) has been chatting to Trent Reznor and that Trent organised a VIP pass for him. WTF?!! What the hell do Trent and Tim have in common? The answer is more sensible and obvious than you might otherwise think.

When Tim was initiating the HEROES ARG he went looking for other ARGs and found that the best of them was Trent Reznor's NIN ARG for YEAR ZERO (it's worth reading the wiki link). So Tim started communication with Trent about the HEROES ARG. See? Makes more sense than you'd think!

So we're chatting away for ages and James gets a call. He says he has to meet Tim. "Keppler? (the other writer on Into the Wild)" I ask.

"No, Kring. My boss."

I use all my self control and cool to maintain some sort of equilibrium. A bit leaks out to my eyebrow which raises. I like to think I had a glint to my eye too, but only Rick and James can say. "Tim Kring? Really? James, I'd love to meet him if that's possible."

James says that's no problem and will bring him by.

So Tim swings by wearing a dull orange shirt. Accompanying him was his beautiful wife Lisa. James introduces me and Tim says, "Have we met before? You look familiar...?"

I note that I have a familiar face and get that a lot. I also add that I do work for him. But I think that got lost in the polite laughter of my previous comment. I introduce myself to his lovely wife and then it's time to go. It's 9:05pm and the concert's about to start though. So we say goodbye and everyone rushes off to their seats mere minutes before it begins.

The last live show I saw was Ka by the Cirus Du Soleil. That was a spectacle so beautiful it almost made me weep. The last time I saw Nine Inch Nails was last year at the Metro where Trent spat it. It left a really bad taste in my mouth, but I came back ready to be impressed... and I was.

What I saw in Melbourne was a gig. A band tearing it up on a small stage. Just them, the music and the incredible energy. As you can see, he is feet away from the audience.

What I saw Saturday night was a mind-blowing show, a rock concert, a true spectacle, and total sensory experience (aroma provided by nearby pot smokers). The design was brilliant and awe inspiring. The set design was influenced by his album art. Geometric bold furniture bending at 90 degree angles reminiscent of THE SLIP ushered in the concert.

A curving screen framed the back of the stage, and a similar transparent one lowered down at the front of the stage. But they could project video onto the screen to make it opaque with images reminiscent of album art as far back as Pretty Hate Machine . My favourite was a concentric circle of static on all the screens, in front and behind the band. As Trent approached and sang, the static would part to the intensity of his voice. Then, with a flick of his wrist the static would spin around the band, with Trent's figure cutting a hole in this moving storm of static. It was wild.

The whole scene and mood changed with the effects complementing the music. Even the interludes from Ghosts were engaging and ethereal.

I was sitting next to a girl, Melissa who also came by herself. We were both adamant that we wouldn't miss seeing NIN live, even if we had to be Scott Nofrenz (say it out loud fast). When Trent yelled "Thank you" bowed and left, she shook my hand, gave me her card and bid me goodbye. I asked her if she was going to stay for the encore. She told me she saw five NIN concerts last year and they never did an encore. I shrugged and she left. She had been gone a while when Trent came back on. I desperately started plugging her number into my phone to call her. I was about to hit dial when she came stumbling back to her seat. It ended up being not so much an encore, but rather the second half after a brief intermission. He played another five or six songs including Reptile, which I love.

Several times I glanced at Tim Kring in the VIP area (an orange shirt in a sea of black is not hard to see). He sat continually on the edge of his seat with a huge grin on his face. I hazard to guess he's not a huge NIN fan, but he knows a fellow visionairy in Trent when he sees one. And the experience would have kept anyone with five senses engaged.

I couldn't get in touch with James at the end so I headed off. I wanted to say a proper goodbye, as we had all rushed off. An hour later I get a text from him, "Meeting Trent! OMFG!"

Godamn it.

But hey, I got to meet Tim Kring. One can't be too greedy, right?

I'd accompany this with some photos, but the new Iphone has no zoom and it's not a great camera for events like this. I might see if I can upload some stuff later.

I promise to talk about Root and Branch part 1 next post. I promise! But hey, meeting Tim Kring at a NIN concert has gotta justify some space, right?