Track Listing

1. Gave Up
2. Wish
3. Happiness In Slavery
4. Throw This Away
5. First Fuck
6. Screaming Slave

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #63659 in Music
• Released on: 1992-12-01
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Single, Explicit Lyrics
• Running time: 33 minutes

Customer Reviews

Mr Reznor, You are spoiling us....
If you read the reviews - opinion is clearly split on this little EP!

Personally, i loved it when it first came out, and 15 years on, its actually matured with age!

I'm going to polarise further with this remark - but this is one for the connoisseur of industrial. It harks back to the earlier days of industrial, before the genre was hijacked by overused guitars and standard (boring) metal overtones. The sound is minimal and bleak. The samples are choice and abrasive. Vocals are repetitive but effective. And the programming, even 15 years on, its absolutely awesome. Man, this is just a classic - similar in tone to the late 80's output of Ministry. (Think 'stigmata' etc). And if all that interests you - then buy the EP now.

However, if you like your industrial noise pretty, poppy and oh-so very accessible - then look elsewhere. Not to be revisionist - but later NIN stuff (and even PHM, for that matter) hooked in a lot of the Good Charlotte / teen-angst posse, who no doubt did, and apparently do, hate this stuff. Maybe this explains the motivations of the naysayers of this absolute gem? A matter of opinion, i suppose...

Anyway - an article of the time stated, 'this is a paradox; fixed is more broken than 'broken'!" Too right. If you think 'Head like a hole' is the be-all-and-end-all of industrial, then look elsewhere. However, if you see that classic as a 'good start' which doesn't go far enough - then buy this EP immediately. Trent is an ambassador for his genre, but this demonstrates he is clearly an auteur, an innovator and a genius too.

This is not music.
For every Sin or Starf**kers Inc., Trent Reznor has a habit of making half a dozen pieces of unlistenable nonsense. There's an over-indulgent mess of feedback, jarring noise and over-repetative sampled vocals. The J G Thirlwell remixes are particularly bad. Overall it's the sound of a man with his head up his own .. well, you know the rest. This is not music.

Fixed: An unsung masterpiece
After the excellent Broken, that adopted a more metal stance than the electronica laden Pretty Hate Machine, Trent Reznor went away and created something with more of a Techno flavour - and it tastes delicious!

This CD contains remixes of songs from the Broken EP, but, unlike Broken, it's action from the off - Reznor chose to drop the brief but wonderful interlude-like tracks Pinion and Help Me I'm In Hell. What this creates is a fast paced album from start to finish, barely letting up in it's 40 minutes of wonderfully harsh noise.

It begins with Gave Up, a remix of the track from Broken with the same name, and it gives you a taste of what is to come throughout the maxi-single. By rearranging and cutting up the vocals from the original track, Reznor creates a very fast paced barrage of non-stop, perfectly crafted sound.

We then move onto Wish, also a remix of the track from Broken with the same name. Although this song is more subdued, even semi-calm at times, it's still decidedly NIN in it's sound. Reznor didn't stray away from the original Wish much with this one, instead he chose to play with how it plays - using a 'stuck record' effect quite often, and fusing it with a bit more electronica.

Happiness In Slavery comes next, which is, again, a remix of the Broken track of the same name. Whereas Wish stayed fairly true to the original, H.i.S. is quite different - the only lyrics that remain are Reznor's inhuman sounding shrieks of "slavery", with the occassional sequence of screams, interwoven with a great sounding beat-laden track more akin to something from The Downward Spiral than Broken. The highlight of the CD.

Throw this away has a slower, more eerie feel to it than the rest of the maxi-single, opening with a repetitive, chilling sound of who-knows-what. The beat of a distorted guitar kick in shortly afterwards, following which Trent Reznor begins to whisper his lyrics, showing his trademark signs of torment with such lines as "I am so dirty / on the inside". All the while, the music builds up, until it explodes into a flurry of wailing guitars and synth-drums towards the end. Good stuff.

Next up is Fist F**k, another remix of Gave Up. Again, Trent uses the 'stuck record' effect often - perhaps a little TOO often - and great sounding 'backwards' segments of music. Strange samples and relentless drumming fill the track, and is really something to behold.

Last, but by no means least, is Screaming Slave, another remix of Happiness In Slavery. It opens with a series of sounds that are reminiscent of the old Nintendo game F-Zero - it almost sounds as if a futuristic Formula 1 is taking place. But then, the music is interspersed with this 'noise', which is continually building up, until it all falls apart, and we hear more backwards segments of music. What we are given next is a series of severely distorted sections of the original track, all the while breaking down and sticking. Many people will just disregard this track as relentless noise - to appreciate this madness is not an easy task. Towards the end, we hear a poor Trent Reznor screaming in apparent pain, either physically or mentally, which is evidently where this track gains it's name "Screaming Slave". The noise ensues shortly after, with "slavery" being shrieked. Great stuff.

Obviously this CD does not rival The Downward Spiral, but it is an absolute ESSENTIAL for any NIN fan. However, to really appreciate this, a copy of Broken is a must.

Oh, one more thing - DO NOT listen to this CD when you are exceedingly tired and on the brink of falling asleep. That is, unless you WANT it to mess with your head!