"Happiness in Slavery" is a song by American

industrial rock Industrial rock is a fusion genre that fuses industrial music and rock music. It initially originated in the 1970s, and drew influence from early experimental and industrial acts such as Throbbing Gristle, Einstürzende Neubauten and Chrom ...

band

Nine Inch Nails Nine Inch Nails, commonly abbreviated as NIN (stylized as NIИ), is an American industrial rock band formed in Cleveland, Ohio in 1988. Its members are the singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer Trent Reznor and his frequent col ...

from their

extended play An extended play (EP) is a Sound recording and reproduction, musical recording that contains more tracks than a Single (music), single but fewer than an album. Contemporary EPs generally contain up to eight tracks and have a playing time of 1 ...

, '' Broken'' (1992). It was released in November 1992 as a

promotional single A promotional recording, promo, or plug copy is an audio or video recording distributed free, usually in order to promote a recording that is or soon will be commercially available. Promos are normally sent directly to broadcasters, such as mu ...

from the EP. The song takes its title and refrain from Jean Paulhan's preface to Pauline Réage's 1954 erotic novel '' Story of O''. "Happiness in Slavery" peaked at number 13 on the US ''Billboard''

Modern Rock Tracks Alternative Airplay (formerly known as Modern Rock Tracks between 1988 and 2009, and Alternative Songs between 2009 and 2020) is a music chart published in the American magazine ''Billboard'' since September 10, 1988. It ranks the 40 most-playe ...

chart. Nine Inch Nails' performance of "Happiness in Slavery" at

Woodstock '94 Woodstock '94 was an American music festival held in 1994 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the original Woodstock festival of 1969. It was promoted as "2 More Days of Peace and Music". The poster used to promote the first concert was r ...

, included on the concert's compilation album, won the

Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance The Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance is an award presented at the Grammy Awards to recording artists for works (songs or albums) containing quality performances in the heavy metal music genre. The Grammy Awards is an annual ceremony, where ...

in 1996. The song's music video was almost universally banned for its depiction of Bob Flanagan being tortured by a machine.

Music video

The music video for "Happiness in Slavery", directed by Jon Reiss, was inspired by the 1899 novel '' The Torture Garden'' by French author

Octave Mirbeau Octave Henri Marie Mirbeau (; 16 February 1848 – 16 February 1917) was a French novelist, art critic, travel writer, pamphleteer, journalist and playwright, who achieved celebrity in Europe and great success among the public, whilst still app ...

. It features

performance artist Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...

Bob Flanagan entering a large room, placing a flower and a candle on an altar. He then removes all of his clothing and washes himself before lying down on a machine that straps him in. Long robotic claws arise from the machine and subsequently tear apart his skin and impale his hands. He reacts with pleasure as this occurs. There are also drills that drill into his skin in various places and let his blood drip onto the floor beneath, where there is a garden apparently being fertilized by human blood. Later in the video, large grinders emerge from the machine to cause extreme injury to the man's skin. As he continues to scream in a mixture of pleasure and pain, the machine begins to disembowel him, ultimately killing him. It then engulfs the man's body in a metal cask and minces it into fertilizer for the garden below. At the end,

Trent Reznor Michael Trent Reznor (born May 17, 1965) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and composer. He came to prominence as the founder, lead singer, multi-instrumentalist, and primary songwriter of the industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails. T ...

, who had been singing the lyrics inside a cell at the beginning of the video, enters the room and begins to perform the same ritual that the previous man had performed, the video fading to black as he lights a candle. The video was almost universally banned once released, but was later included on the '' Closure'' video album and in the '' Broken'' film. It was featured on '' Too Much 4 Much'',

MuchMusic Much is a Canadian English language discretionary specialty channel owned by BCE Inc. through its Bell Media subsidiary that airs programming aimed at teenagers and young adults. It is headquartered at 299 Queen Street West in what was o ...

's showcase of videos banned from their regular programming. Reznor commented that the video was not created for

shock value Shock value (or shock factor) is the potential of an image, text, action, or other form of communication, such as a public execution, to provoke a reaction of sharp disgust, shock, anger, fear, or similar negative emotions. In advertising Sho ...

, but because "these were the most appropriate visuals for the song." It had to do with his artistic freedom at the time after his fallout with TVT Records.

Track listings

*US promotional CD single #"Happiness in Slavery" (LP version) – 5:26 *US promotional CD single #"Happiness in Slavery" (Flaccid edit) – 4:17 #"Happiness in Slavery" (LP version) – 5:26 *US promotional 12" single :A1. "Happiness in Slavery" (''

Fixed Fixed may refer to: * ''Fixed'' (EP), EP by Nine Inch Nails * ''Fixed'' (film), an upcoming animated film directed by Genndy Tartakovsky * Fixed (typeface), a collection of monospace bitmap fonts that is distributed with the X Window System * Fi ...

'' version) – 6:09 :A2. "Happiness in Slavery" ( Sherwood Slave Mix) – 2:17 :B1. "Happiness in Slavery" ( PK Slavery Remix) – 5:41 :B2. "Happiness in Slavery" ('' Broken'' version) – 5:21

Charts

Samples

The track was sampled for "Centipede" by Canadian

extreme metal Extreme metal is a loosely defined umbrella term for a number of related heavy metal music subgenres that have developed since the early 1980s. It has been defined as a "cluster of metal subgenres characterized by sonic, verbal, and visual tran ...

band

Strapping Young Lad Strapping Young Lad (SYL) was a Canadian extreme metal band formed by Devin Townsend in Vancouver in 1994. The band started as a one-man studio project; Townsend played most of the instruments on the 1995 debut album, '' Heavy as a Really Heavy ...

, appearing on their 1997 live album '' No Sleep 'till Bedtime''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Happiness In Slavery 1992 songs Black-and-white music videos Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance Nine Inch Nails songs Song recordings produced by Trent Reznor Songs about BDSM Songs written by Trent Reznor Industrial metal songs Music video controversies