History of Industrial Music, pt 1

Early Days of the 70’s

Industrial music was originally formed by a collaborating group of artists that felt kinship for each other who were experimenting in various media. A collection of performance art, music, and machines created an artistic environment for its development. These were for the great part outside artists working far outside the norm. They eventually came up with a manifesto of five ideals of what would be called Industrial.

The Industrial Culture Handbook lists these five ideals as such: One, Organizational Autonomy being the DIY desire to be independent of record labels and produce their own work. Two, Access to Information which in the days before the internet meant presenting ideas that mainstream media did not give time to. Three, Use of Synthesizers and Anti-Music which would use found sounds, tape loops, and new electronic instruments to create music. Four, Extra-Musical Elements which was use of other media besides music alone including art, video, symbolism, etc. Five, Shock Tactics such as violence were used to break the fourth wall between band and audience and break their conditioning.

The original group of musicians would include the following: Throbbing Gristle, Monte Cazazza, Z’ev, Non (Boyd Rice), Cabaret Voltaire, and SPK. The term industrial music was coined by Monte Cazazza. He was thinking that the current level of music creation was still being the same as it had been in agricultural society and sought to modernize it so that music could be created by industrial means. The term was picked up by Genesis P’Orridge and Throbbing Gristle and printed on their records the slogan, “Industrial Music for Industrial People” with the record label of Industrial Records.