“Ich tu dir weh” (German: “I’m hurting you”) is a song by German Neue Deutsche Härte band Rammstein. It was the second single from their sixth studio album, Liebe ist für alle da (2009), released 5 February 2010 after a music video had already dropped online on 21 December 2009. The lyrics circle sadomasochistic harm and desire hard enough that the album was placed on Germany’s BPjM “index” of youth-endangering media, forcing a censored re-release. In May 2010 the original uncensored album and the single were de-indexed and could again be sold in Germany without that special restriction.
For BDSM media history the track is a stadium-scale SM anthem: industrial metal packaging of hurt-as-intimacy, complete with state indexing drama, a body-modification video stunt, and live pyro that turns the song into theater of punishment and electric aftercare.
Music Video
Directed by Jonas Åkerlund and hosted on the adult site visit-X for its online premiere, the video shows the band performing on black-and-gray equipment. Till Lindemann and Oliver Riedel wear contact lenses that shift color (Riedel’s to green, Lindemann’s to red). Lindemann’s mouth emits white light when he sings—a cable through the cheek powering a light mounted inside the mouth. He wanted the effect real, so he had his cheek pierced specifically for the shoot. At the climax the stage around keyboardist Flake fills with electricity and the band members appear to explode on the final note. The video’s industrial dungeon palette and self-injury-adjacent staging made adult hosting a logical distribution choice.
Live Performance Ritual
On stage, “Ich tu dir weh” is a pyro set piece. Mid-song Lindemann and Flake run a choreographed fight that ends with Flake forced into a large bathtub. Lindemann rises on a platform high above and pours a mass of sparks from a milk can into the tub, triggering huge explosions; Flake reemerges in a silver holographic suit. Early German dates of the Liebe ist für alle da tour modified lyrics so Lindemann could perform under BPjM constraints when the original text was tagged inappropriate—an unusual case of a band rewriting live SM lyrics under youth-protection indexing rather than mere radio edit pressure.
Single Formats and Remixes
All songs credited to Rammstein. The limited CD single carried:
- “Ich tu dir weh (Radio Edit)” – 3:57
- “Pussy (Lick It Remix)” by Scooter – 4:54
- “Rammlied (Rammin’ the Steins Remix)” by Devin Townsend – 5:09
- “Ich tu dir weh (Smallboy Remix)” by Jochen Schmalbach – 6:42
The 12″ vinyl paired the radio edit with a Fukkk Offf remix (6:07)—black vinyl in Europe, white in the UK. A 7″ single-sided etched vinyl held only the radio edit (black Europe / red UK). The digital EP bundled the radio edit, the Scooter and Devin Townsend remixes, the Smallboy remix, and the Fukkk Offf remix, plus a digital booklet. That multi-format rollout treated the SM single like a collector fetish object as much as a chart weapon.
Chart performance varied by territory, but the cultural payload outran pure peak positions: a mainstream metal band putting sadomasochistic first-person harm on a major-label single, getting the parent album indexed, winning de-indexing months later, and locking the song into tour mythology with bathtub lightning and cheek hardware. “Ich tu dir weh” remains Rammstein’s clearest pop-metal handshake with BDSM aesthetics—hurt named in the title, staged in the video, litigated by youth censors, and celebrated in arenas where thousands scream the pain back.
