Industry can be defined as a sector of the national economy dealing with the extraction of raw materials, their processing and subsequent production of various products. I wrote about the music industry last time. However, there is a musical genre that is directly called industry. Industrial, get to know it:
In 1976, the avant-garde band Throbbing Gristle founded the music label Industrial Records. Originally, it was only intended to serve as a music label for their music. The publishing house also signed contracts with other artists. It gave its name to the entire musical genre.
The origins of industrial go back even deeper. One could say that it dates back to the beginning of the last century. With the development of technology and the electrification of society, it was only a matter of time before this progress would also be reflected in music. The first composers were students of classical music or electrical engineering. Often both (Kraftwerk). They explored new possibilities for working with sound. At first, it was not even possible to talk about music as such.
The first instrument and the oldest recordings could be the records from 1937. Specifically, an instrument called Theremin. St. Petersburg native Lev Sergeyevich Theremin, known as Leon Theremin, constructed a truly amazing thing. If you don’t know this instrument, I recommend looking it up on YouTube, you will be very surprised.
The fathers of electronic music could be considered François Bayle, Piere Schaeffer, Bernard Parmegiani, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Iannis Xenakis,… But we are already in the 1950s. About a decade earlier, the Music Concrete style was in vogue, the basic feature of which is to transform an existing sound into another sound. Electroacoustic music? Atonal music? Sound collage? It is difficult to find the right box, and in fact, it is not necessary. So we will go back in time to the second half of the 1970s.
Industrial music was supposed to be the music of the young, modern person of the last quarter of the 20th century. There are reasons why this did not happen. Industrial music is generally more difficult to access for the mass/mainstream audience. There are also more commercial subgenres such as industrial dance/future pop (although they are much younger), but their melancholy sets them apart from the mainstream music.
Housing estates, construction sites, concrete, working class, poverty. How much beautiful music has come from these ingredients? Blues, rock, punk, industrial, noise, hip hop… Noise is a separate (non)musical genre, but industrial also draws partly from it. The genres are often mixed together, but that would be like the Lord of the Rings of music.
It is difficult to write about industrial without all these diversions. The musical style, which is relatively unknown, multi-layered and complex, is almost impossible to explain in just a few words. The characteristic features are a raw, even primitive sound, mixing musical instruments with work tools (Einstürzende Neubauten), noise, frequent use of various samples (excerpts from other audio recordings), metapolitics (Laibach). Sequencers, synthesizers, guitars and everything possible and impossible that can produce sound are used. Preferably loud. Of course, computers are used today. Industrial music is their pioneer. The lyrics are mostly punk-like, socially critical attitude towards society, satire. The industrial scene overlaps with the cyberpunk (Cassandra Complex), synthesizer (Melotron, mesh), EBM – Electronic body music (Skinny Puppy, Front 242,), rock (Nine Inch Nails), metal (Rammstein/NDH – Neue Deutsche Härte/New German Hardness), hip hop (Klangstabil). Many artists and bands mix different styles together, or have several periods/positions (Die Krupps – electronic/metal, Appoptygma Berzerk – EBM/Future pop/electronic rock/Berlin school -ambient/(retro)synth-wave).
A fan of industrial music is called a Rivethead. It literally means rivet head. In 1940, Ben Hamper’s book Rivethead: Tales From the Assembly Line was published in the USA. In 1993, Re-Construction Records released the compilation Rivet Head Culture. The label’s founder, Glenn Chase, used the term to describe fans of industrial. In the same year, industrial rock band Chemlab, Glenn’s friends, released the song Rivet Head on their debut album Burn out at the Hydrogen Bar. I also came across a story that fans of the heavy metal band Iron Maiden (which is far from industrial) were supposed to be called that, but it didn’t catch on. Whether that’s true or not, no one knows. There are plenty of different jokes on the industrial scene. Visually, the horror character Hellraiser, created by splatterpunk writer and filmmaker Clive Barker, is also referred to as a rivet head. Johan van Roy, among others, paid musical tribute to him with his aggrotech project Suicide Commando in the song of the same name Hellraiser. You probably guessed correctly that aggrotech is a younger subgenre of industrial. Rivet Heads often have a military appearance, their clothing resembles uniforms, but is mostly black. Heavy
Heavy boots, pocketbooks, tank tops, band t-shirts, capes and coats. Chains and metal, extravagance combined with elegance. White makeup, black eyeshadow are more of a thing of the past today. Sometimes you can still see Cybergoths in clubs (they really haven’t died out) – they are characterized by neon artificial dreadlocks – cyberlocks, neon stockings on their arms and legs, artificial imitations of respirators with colored spikes. They are also referred to as industrial rave (X-Rx, SAM).
So much for industrial music in short. I started listening to it around 2005. I was 20 years old at the time and studying at university. I finally had access to the internet and that was a miracle. I discovered new music almost every day and that has lasted me until today.
Modest sources: Wikipedia (website), Orkus (German music magazine), HISVoice (Czech music magazine), Ishkur´s Guide to Electronic Music (website), Discogs.com (website)
Author
Dr. Love
Electronic music producer, DJ, cameraman, photographer and art enthusiast of various kinds. Made in 1985, graduated as a graphic designer, cameraman, editor and director. Music is his great passion. He got into industrial and various other styles of the alternative music, so-called dark scene, through punk and techno.
Black Bat Records 
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