Named after a 1984
Coil single, How to Destroy Angels feature
Nine Inch Nails'
Trent Reznor, former
West Indian Girl singer (and
Reznor's wife) Mariqueen Maandig, and
Atticus Ross (
12 Rounds,
NIN). Work on the project began a few months after
Nine Inch Nails' final show of their Wave Goodbye tour in September 2009. The following spring, the group made its debut with the single A Drowning and a video for the song "The Space in Between," which premiered that May. Soon after, the band made its self-titled debut EP -- which was produced by
Ross -- available as a free download. That July, How to Destroy Angels was released on CD through the
Null label. In 2011, the group contributed a cover of
Bryan Ferry's "Is Your Love Strong Enough" to the soundtrack of the David Fincher film The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which
Reznor and
Ross also scored. The following year, How to Destroy Angels prepared their second release, An Omen EP, which became their first major-label recording. A full-length album called Welcome Oblivion appeared in March 2013, just after
Reznor announced he was planning to take a new version of
Nine Inch Nails on the road in 2014. Welcome Oblivion peaked at number 30 on the Billboard 200 and featured the single "How Long?" ~ Heather Phares