10 Legendary Musicians That Play Multiple Instruments

When going through the traditional lineup for rock and roll bands, you can normally find the leader of the group pretty quickly. It might be easy to just think of the singer as the one pulling the strings in the band, but anyone can be the true guiding light behind the music. For this one, Trent Reznor is more than just the frontman. Throughout every iteration of Nine Inch Nails, it has always been Trent's baby from skin to core.

Originally starting off on the piano, Trent fashioned himself into the world of industrial, playing nearly every instrument he could to flesh out his sound. While piano might not have been the coolest thing to be learning first, the lessons that he learned there helped give him a good outline for how to tackle any other instrument, going from loud blasts of guitar on songs like March of the Pigs to making some of the most off kilter drumming you'll ever hear in your life on the back half of Piggy.

If there's one instrument that Trent really has a trademark for, it's his style of production. Layering different pieces of sound across every single record, Reznor practically uses the mixing board as an instrument half the time, making some of the most jarring sounds that you'll ever hear. Even after scoring films and making stretched out albums of ambient music, Trent's motivation was never about just playing every single instrument he could. It was about setting a mood, and the songs of Nine Inch Nails have brought us to the edge of insanity more than a few times.