Ongoing History Daily: Censored Nine Inch Nails
Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails has always wanted to push things to the limits with all the videos he produces. Back in 1994, the clip for “Happiness in Slavery” was banned by MTV because it features a naked S&M performance artist being sacrificed to a big chomping machine. The dude basically ends up as hamburger.
The video for “Closer” includes all kinds of surrealist images, including crucified monkeys. The ultimate is the long-form video for the Broken EP. Copies are floating around on the Internet, so you can find them but beware. You should know that Trent didn’t want to release it because it was too much, even for him.
In fact, he says this video makes “Happiness in Slavery” look like a Pixar movie.
A friend had a copy back in university in the 90’s. We watched it. Really, really disturbing.
Legend has it that Gibby Haynes leaked the original versions