Nine Inch Nails‘ Trent Reznor and his wife Mariqueen Maandig Reznor decided to take their Halloween experience to the next level as they celebrated by dressing up as skeletons on Halloween as revealed in a new social media post.
Billy Corgan and Trent Reznor Steal the Show at Halloween
Billy Corgan and his family also decided to have a lot of fun in their own way for Halloween. His wife Chloe Mendel took to her Instagram and uploaded photos of the whole family cosplaying as Harry Potter characters.
Smashing Pumpkins‘ Billy Corgan was dressed up as Voldemort while his wife was cosplaying Bellatrix Lestrange. Their children also dressed up as Harry Potter, Hermione Granger and as a witch, so it was clear they were all having a blast on Halloween.
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Billy Corgan and Trent Reznor Have Dealt With Their Personal Demons
Despite their success, both Billy Corgan and Trent Reznor had to deal with a lot of personal issues that really affected them, especially back in the 90s as they confronted their own demons.
While speaking in an older interview with The Guardian, Trent Reznor reflected on how deeply he struggled during the Downward Spiral era, calling it a time when he was consumed by anger and self-hatred.
“I was thinking a lot about The Downward Spiral album era, and the person I was at that time,” he said. “Downward Spiral felt like I had an unending, bottomless pit of rage and self-loathing inside me, and I had to somehow channel something or I’d explode. I thought I could get through by putting everything into my music, standing in front of an audience and screaming emotions at them from my guts … but after a while, it didn’t sustain itself, and other things took over – drugs and alcohol.”
Reznor went on to say that recovery and self-awareness changed his outlook completely.
“And I’m happy that I don’t feel that way anymore. I’ve learned to recognize, a lot of it forced through the process of recovery, that I’m wired wrong in certain ways — the chemical balance of my brain is off in terms of depression a little bit. This record was written as the other side of that journey. The despair and loneliness and rage and isolation and the not-fitting-in aspect that still is in me, but I can express that in a way that feels more appropriate to who I am now. And often that rage is quieter.”
Reznor married singer Mariqueen Maandig in Oct. 2009; together they formed How to Destroy Angels and built a family. They have sons Lazarus Echo, Balthazar Venn, and a third son whose name is not public, and daughters Nova Lux and another whose name is not public.
Billy Corgan’s mental health struggles
As for Billy Corgan, his own issues almost cost him his life as he revealed in an interview Why Not Now? With Amy Jo Martin.
After releasing their debut album Gish in May 1991, the Smashing Pumpkins were on the rise. However, when Nirvana’s Nevermind and Pearl Jam’s Ten were released later that same year, Billy Corgan started to feel lost about his place in the music scene.
He felt that the rules of the industry had suddenly changed, and what once made him feel successful no longer seemed important. This led him into a deep depression and a period of self-doubt.
During that time, Corgan said he reached a breaking point where he felt he had to either end his life or completely change it. He admitted to being in such a dark state that he had started giving away his belongings and even thinking about his own eulogy. But one morning, he had a moment of clarity.
He realized that if he wasn’t going to end his life, he needed to take control and move forward. That same morning, he wrote the song “Today,” one of the band’s most famous tracks. Though the song is about despair, its message is ultimately about hope and finding value in each new day.
“Within a short span of time I went from thinking I was very successful within my given field, to all the rules had changed in my given field. Everything I had built myself up to be and do was no longer as relevant as it needed to be. I went into a very strange depression because I felt like something had been not taken, but the change made me feel kind of inadequate in a way I wasn’t prepared for.”
I reached this kind of morning in my life where it was like I’m either going to jump out a window, or I was going to change my life. I know that sounds very dramatic, but that’s literally what happened. I couldn’t meditate on death anymore than I had, I’d even gotten to the point where, they say it’s very troubling in suicide land if you start giving away your possessions. I’d already been through all those stages, I was giving away stuff and planning my eulogy, and all sorts of weird self-absorbed things.”
Billy Corgan and Trent Reznor find happiness
Corgan brought listeners back to a moment of clarity which may have saved his life. I woke up one morning, and I kind of stared out the window and thought, ‘Okay, well, if you’re not going to jump out the window, you better do whatever it is you need to do,’” the musician described. “That morning I wrote, I think it was the song ‘Today,’ which people would probably be fairly familiar with, it’s the ice cream truck video song. It’s sort of a wry observation on suicide, but in essence the meditation behind the lyric is that every day is the best day, if you let it be.”
Corgan and designer Chloé Mendel have been together since the 2010s; they married in Sept. 2023. They have three children, and they are clearly happier than ever, but that wouldn’t have happened if Corgan hadn’t taken control of his life first. Together they run Madame ZuZu’s Teahouse in Chicago.
Both Trent Reznor and Billy Corgan struggled deeply with mental health during the 1990s alternative rock era. Reznor fought addiction and depression during his Nine Inch Nails success but eventually found peace through recovery, music, and family. Corgan battled depression and suicidal thoughts early in The Smashing Pumpkins’ career, using songwriting to help him heal.
Both men went through dark times but learned to rebuild their lives and are clearly the best versions of themselves and fans wouldn’t have it any other way. Now they’re both rocking stages, and adding flavor to tea and film soundtracks respectively.
