The Formative Years Of Industrial Music

Critics of electronic industrial often make the assertion that industrial music was never intending to be dance music, or electronic music, or accessable music. That may be true, in some cases, but, looking back at some tracks by these bands, you can find examples of melodic uses of the electronic instruments and synthesizers that the era had to offer. Even experimentalist like Throbbing Gristle had tracks like “United” that featured prominent keyboards and clearly sung vocals.

Of course, other bands, 70’s electronic pioneers such as Kraftwerk, early techno artists, and rock musicians like Gary Numan, vastly influenced the scope of what the next wave of industrial bands would do.

Many fans of experimental industrial criticize the viability of any music past the prime late-70’s time period, stating that industrial music died with Throbbing Gristle, that electronic dance music and rock music are not “industrial”. I do not think any credence can be lent to this argument at all. For every genre to continue any form of existence, it must continue to grow and evolve. Industrial is a music genre, like any other, and it must change over time, be it for better or worst. People find it much easier to find a similarity between two artists like Elvis and Aerosmith and call them both “rock” music. They don’t see any rational similarities between Throbbing Gristle and Front 242 and Hate Dept.

And it is obvious now that these experimentalists of the late 1970’s truly led the way down a new path in music… They paved the way for other bands to find an audience in a genre of experimentation, noise, and socially probing thought.

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