Broken

My first memory about this album was the video for Wish that I saw one late night on Mtv. My first thought was “Nine Inch Nails has album?” Broken was released completely under my radar at the time. I went out the next day and bought it and didn’t even realize that it was an EP until the final song was finished, I didn’t even notice the 99 tracks until a few days later when I thought it was the coolest thing. I never did see that video again, and if you haven’t seen it then you are missing something awesome. I had seen Trent and his merry men live by then, and I wanted it to have Trent in a cage with all of us trying to get in (like a thunderdome).

Sometime later I bought the video (since lost) and watched some of my viewing partners turn away, or leave, in disgust during the Happiness in Slavery video. It was and remains hardcore. The genius of it was that this imagery fit very well with the music and Trent got away with it, he beat the record companies who without a doubt wanted to do something a little more mainstream.

Trent recorded this album in secret because the record company wanted another album like Pretty Hate Machine. They released this album anyway. For once I never recalled anyone making a fuss about it, everyone seems to complain if a follow-up isn’t the same as the original. Personally I always thought that music is an ever changing medium that should be embraced for its difference, so good for Trent. Of course I didn’t know many other people who were into Nine Inch Nails as much as I was at this time (after Downward Spiral that would change).

This album is violent. Not violence in anger, but more of a type of violence for the appreciation of the beauty of watching two will participants hurt each other; like a mixed gender fight club, with more leather. The album is partially based on The Story of O (which I have never read but know about). As a result it plays out much like a DeSade erotic S&M novel in musical form. Keeping this album an EP was a great decision. The music here burns out quickly and there were plenty of albums that have a bunch of crappy filler songs that only turn a great EP into a horrible album.

Even though this is an EP it is a very important album in the Nine Inch Nail’s discography. It established that he was interested in experimentation not only in his musical styles, but also his philosophy and themes. While Pretty Hate Machine focused on “theology” and corruption Broken is focused on S&M images and hedonism. The best experiences are the lyrics. The structure of the songs leaves the listener with bits and pieces of this poetry, but multiple listening are required to get the entire image; or concentration on just the lyrics. This is a great structure because it dishes out a different though each time through.

From the start of Pinion there is a build up to something and that bursts out in Wish and it gets the album going. In my youth I always skipped Pinion and went straight to the meat, I no longer do this. Now I rarely listen to a single song on an album, but instead listen to the entire EP together (usually including bonus tracks). This is definitely something that people don’t go for these days where it is easy to download a single song. There is a certain appreciation of the art of an entire album (or EP) that is slowly being lost.

Wish quickly becomes an in your face intense experience. This song qualifies as sounding more random screaming and noise than most other songs; but there is a beautiful pattern to it. The guitar is the most prominent but there is so much random noise and sounds that it is nearly insane that it all comes together as good as it does. Then almost unexpectedly the song just ends.

Some of the best lyrics in Last describe the song best, “My soul I pissed it all away,” and “I want you to make me, I want you to break me, and I want you to throw me away.” Once again it comes back to The Story of O but it also questions our own freewill. I love the guitar riff in this song too, the best on the album.

I have always loved the fact I hear what I believe are cannons firing in the background of Help me I am in Hell.

The bleak and continued interesting lyrics continue in Happiness in Slavery: “Don’t open your eyes, you won’t like what you see, the devils of truth steal the souls of the free;” “The blind have been blessed with security;” “Stick my hands through the cage of this endless routine, just some flesh caught in this big broken machine.” This song is a direct reference to The Story of O, the title taken from the prologue of the book; but when I first listened to this I didn’t know about that book. This song conveys what I imagine the book to be exactly, and more.

In Gave Up the lyrics discuss the inevitable result of trying to resist. Resisting slavery only will result of the destruction of every aspect of your being (sanity, all that is true) which can be avoided by giving up.

Is there an additional theme of all of us being slaves? Possible. Trent was experiencing the actions a record company that was trying to dictate what his follow-up album was to be. The end of the EP (not including the bonus tracks) he advocates giving up, which he obviously didn’t follow through on. Twice in the EP (in the last two songs) he references the “machine” which I have always seen as a reference to Pretty Hate Machine in that while in that album he discusses any deviation from “God’s will” as a sin and freedom is just God’s excuse to punish us; in Broken free will inevitably leads to submission (in one form or another) regardless. If there is a Christian God (a topic to be discussed more in future albums) he has only given us a choice to be a slave to him, or a slave to another – free will is an illusion. At the end of Broken acceptance of submission leads to enlightenment greater than pretending there is any “free will”.

Listening to the two albums together we find that there is no real free will, and the excuse itself is only a lie.