Trent Reznor might never escape those ghouls.
No one quite knew what to expect from Saturday’s re-vamped collaboration between veteran industrial rockers Nine Inch Nails and their recent tourmate, the German electro producer Boys Noize. Billed here as Nine Inch Noize, the pairing had experience on stages together, teaming up for the nightly middle third of Nails’ recent Peel It Back tour. That segment of the show largely stripped out the guitars to focus on clubby techno and nasty slashes of synth noise. What would it look like as a whole Sahara Tent set, though?
INDIO, CA, APRIL 11, 2026: Nine Inch Noize performs at the Sahara stage during the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival at the Empire Polo Club in Indio on Saturday, April 11, 2026. (Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
A pretty evil and extraordinary set piece showing what the Sahara allows an act that really wants to use it.
Performing in a cutout in the middle of a huge elevated ramp, Reznor, his Nails bandmate Atticus Ross and Boys Noize hovered atop a dense rack of synths and samplers. They built on the ethos of their arena show, stripping the NIN catalog like “Closer,” “Heresy,” “The Warning” and “Copy of A” for parts, rebuilding them for this strobe-licked club setting.
One surprise for Coachella fans driving out was a billboard announcing Nine Inch Noize had a whole album of collaborative material en route, and the segments they played here revealed how crucial Boys Noize is to this new setup. His bone-snapping breakdowns and vicious, detuned clangs wouldn’t be possible without Reznor’s ‘90s industrial vision, but here he returned the favor to ensure this combo translated on a dedicated rave stage.
The Sahara is Coachella’s usual home for K-pop, hip-hop and EDM. But here, it finally found an act that fully availed themselves of space. Just look at what crawled up that ramp after them.
INDIO, CA, APRIL 11, 2026: Nine Inch Noize performs at the Sahara stage during the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival at the Empire Polo Club in Indio on Saturday, April 11, 2026. (Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
A dozen or so dancers—well, dancing is an elegant word for what these muck-spackled, eye-blacked creatures were doing up there. Writhing in formation around the band, clawing at them, occasionally slipping down the ramp in time like they were all descending to hell. It looked like Nine Inch Noize were playing for the cave goblins in “The Descent,” but still kind of sexy?
Reznor’s wife and How To Destroy Angels bandmate, Mariqueen Maandig Reznor, also joined the trio for some choice vocal harmonies, and they looked they were having an absolute blast together. How much fun must it be to stand next to your wife onstage screaming “GOD IS DEAD AND NO ONE CARES” while a bunch of wretched fiends roll around at your feet?
INDIO, CA, APRIL 11, 2026: Nine Inch Noize performs at the Sahara stage during the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival at the Empire Polo Club in Indio on Saturday, April 11, 2026. (Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
A core principle of NIN is that the band is malleable. Members come and go, styles evolve with the times and tools available, but wherever Reznor and Ross are gathered in the name of elegant brutality, the band can follow anywhere. Who knows if Nine Inch Nails will stay on tour for much longer, given the duo’s robust film-score career. Part of me wants this Nine Inch Noize set to enter Coachella lore and be a one-and-done occasion.
But if you’ve put decades into watching this band, you deserve to see what this incarnation can wrench and writhe into.
