November 1, 2025

Surfing Santa at Nine Inch Nails show in Philadelphia

Surfing Santa at Nine Inch Nails show in Philadelphia

Surfing Santa at Nine Inch Nails show in Philadelphia

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Here’s a funny one. On August 27, 2025, Nine Inch Nails saw an unusual moment during their Philadelphia show when a fan in a full Santa suit crowd-surfed mid-set, prompting frontman Trent Reznor to briefly stop singing and laugh on stage. And there is footage of the incident as well, captured during “Head Like a Hole”.

The clip shows Reznor noticing the red-and-white figure above the crowd before breaking composure and laughing.

The stop was part of the band’s 2025 “Peel It Back” tour.

About Nine Inch Nails

Nine Inch Nails was formed in 1988 in Cleveland, Ohio, by Trent Reznor. The project’s debut album, “Pretty Hate Machine,” appeared in 1989 via TVT Records. After disputes with TVT, Reznor entered a joint venture with Interscope and launched the Nothing Records imprint, releasing “Broken” (EP, 1992) and “The Downward Spiral” (1994), followed by “The Fragile” (1999) and “With Teeth” (2005).

Later releases include “Year Zero” (2007), the self-released “Ghosts I–IV” and “The Slip” (both 2008), “Hesitation Marks” (2013), “Not the Actual Events” (EP, 2016), “Add Violence” (EP, 2017), “Bad Witch” (2018), and the 2020 “Ghosts V: Together” and “Ghosts VI: Locusts.”

Atticus Ross became an official member in 2016; the current core members are Reznor and Ross.

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