I haven't bought a Nine Inch Nails record in nearly a decade. Part of the reason for this is that, as of late, the Nails' front man/everythingman Trent Reznor has been giving the goodies away, à la Radiohead. Also, I haven't liked the recent albums all that much.

Sorry, fellow rivet-heads, but it's true. Little bits of 2007's "Year Zero" and 2005's "With Teeth" are worthwhile, but no NIN album has floored me the way "The Downward Spiral" did 14 years ago. (Maybe Reznor should have saved that title for a late-career retrospective, when it wouldn't have seemed prescient.) I give Reznor full marks for making five albums in the time it's taken Axl Rose to make three-quarters of one, but I'm just not feeling the Nails in my back the way I used to.

That's not to say that I'm not interested in seeing Nine Inch Nails live at KeyArena on July 26, with openers Crystal Castles, Deerhunter, Does It Offend You, Yeah? and A Place to Bury Strangers. (Tickets go on sale Saturday, May 10.) For all his "ninth-grade poetry," I have to admit that no one can bring the noise to a sports arena quite like Reznor can. The man has created so many uniquely alien sounds that I could have written this preview wholly in onomatopoeia. "Head Like a Hole" goes bahnahnahnahnah. "Wish" goes graownownownow. "Closer" goes boomp-thwomp.

Contrary to the band's public image as a bunch of ebony-clad, ashen-faced sad-asses, NIN puts on a live show that's worthy of booty-shaking and head-banging. It's energetic, invigorating and even joyful. And with guitarist Robin Finck returning to the fold after an extended engagement with Guns N' Roses (Axl Rose just can't catch a break, can he?), it's a virtual certainty that the band will sound the best it has in years.

I can't promise that I'll be at KeyArena July 26. After all, it is an arena show, and it takes some doing to get me to a sports arena even when there's a sporting event happening in it. But I can tell you this: For the first time since the Clinton administration, I'd like to see a Nine Inch Nails concert. I'm ready, once again, for Trent Reznor and company to bring on the thwomp.

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