Trent Reznor (left), Nine Inch Nails“I want to fuck you like an animal.
...You get me closer to God.”
--lyrics from NIN's "Closer"
I found this song through a YouTube video that takes the cake for innovative editing,
marrying Star Trek's S/M homoerotic subtext to NIN's song of violent desire and need. Star Trek + Nine Inch Nails = Closer:
I could add "Closer" to my Teen Spirit list of talking points, started after I vetted the dreadful book on spirituality for teens that said Shiva was a goddess (Teen Spirit 1). The list would now become NC-17, for disturbing sexual content, but spirituality is NC-17, dealing as it does with life and death in the raw.
In fact, Shiva the Destroyer, Hindu god of creation and destruction and transformation, could tie in to "Closer," especially Shiva's manifestation as Lord of the Dance. Shiva's dance of cosmic bliss represents the cycle of life, death, and rebirth--it's the union of opposites, transcending duality. Dualistic systems, such as Christianity, separate the dark from the light, pleasure from pain. Where the two interpenetrate, you get gods like Shiva and songs like "Closer."
Bengali Hymn to Shiva:
"Because you love the burning-ground,
I have made a burning-ground of my heart,
That you, Dark One, hunter of the burning-ground,
May dance your eternal dance."
