- Electronic Music, Avant-Garde Music, Punk Rock, Musique Concrete, Electroacoustic Music, Psychedelic Rock, Art Pop, Free Improvisation, Performance Art
- Post-Punk, Proto Punk, Free Jazz, Krautrock, Progressive Rock, Early Comedy Music, various others
- Old-School Industrial, Electronic Music, Synth Punk
- Post-Punk and Italo Disco (On EBM), Classical Music, House Music, Techno and Trance (Both on Futurepop)
- Electronic Music, EBM, Synth-Pop
- Old School Industrial, Dark Wave, House Music, Techno, Soundtracks, sometimes Trance, Hardcore Techno, Noise Rock, and Harsh Noise
- Old-School Industrial, Hip-Hop (Generally Hardcore Hip-Hop and Alternative Hip Hop)
- EBM, Electro-Industrial, Trip Hop, Alternative Dance, Alternative Rock, Synth-Pop
- Old-School Industrial, Ambient, Drone Music, Harsh Noise, Neoclassical Dark Wave, Neofolk, Marches
- Avant-Garde Music, Classical Music, Folk Music, World Music (In Post-Industrial and some Ambient Industrial), Psychedelic Rock (In Post-Industrial) and Noise Rock
- Old-School Industrial, Harsh Noise, Electro-Industrial, Hardcore Techno,
- EBM, Noise Rock
- Old-School Industrial, Modern Classical Music
- Avant-Garde Music, Ambient (Especially in Death Industrial), Harsh Noise
In the late seventies, when Punk Rock was the dominant form of rebellious music, several artists who were more underground felt that punk was not as effective a means of expressing true rebellion as many had claimed. These musicians decided to move towards the more weird sounds of Electronic Music instead. Rather than embracing the mainstream electronica of their time, however, they drew inspiration from bands like Suicide and strove to combine Electronic Music with various experimental styles such as Avant-Garde Music, Musique Concrete, and Free Improvisation, with a punk mentality.
The new genre grew to be referred to as "Industrial" partly (and primarily) because the majority of its artists were signed to Industrial Records (which was itself founded by members of the pioneering Industrial group Throbbing Gristle), and partly because of the tendency of artists within the genre to involve unconventional, metallic sounding instruments/sounds in the composition of their work (sounding like a Nightmarish Factory).
The first widely recognized Industrial group was the aforementioned Throbbing Gristle, a highly experimental outfit that incorporated electronic music with elements of avant-garde, Dada, and performance art. Their lyrical themes focused mainly on violence, rebellion, sexuality, and neo-pagan philosophy. Band membership consisted of several English performance/visual artists, musicians, and writers already well-known within Britain's underground art scene. Their material was not strictly composed of recognizable electronic instruments; they would use any sound they deemed necessary.
Arguably, German group Einstürzende Neubauten also fit alongside Throbbing Gristle in terms of being one of Industrial's experimental forebears. Lesser known but equally innovative acts like experimental trio Cabaret Voltaire of Sheffield, Chrome of San Francisco, and extreme performance artists SPK of Australia and NON of California also contributed significantly to the fledgling genre.
As electronic music became more popular during The '80s, the earlier kinds of experimental Industrial music underwent refinement and became increasingly synthesizer based. The genre grew in two major directions, the first approaching almost entirely electronic music in the bizarre and experimental spirit of Throbbing Gristle (this direction being exemplified by Canadian group Skinny Puppy), while the second focused more on producing danceable electronic music that retained the cold and aggressive Darker and Edgier qualities and attitude of the early experimental Industrial artists (this direction, often called Electronic Body Music (or EBM) or Industrial Dance, was exemplified by groups such as Nitzer Ebb and Front 242).
Two other, frequently-intersecting "purist" directions in Industrial music also emerged at the turn of the decade: Power Electronics and Post-Industrial. The former was first pioneered by a group called Whitehouse in the late seventies with the express purpose of fusing deliberately offensive lyrics and Sensory Abuse into one teeming mass of Nightmare Fuel. The latter is a much more nebulous term, applying mostly to the many esoterically-inclined groups formed by members, ex-members and colleagues of Psychic TV and Coil (groups that formed from the ashes of Throbbing Gristle following the band's 1981 breakup) alongside those of Nurse With Wound and Current 93. Coil would evolve into Harsh Noise, then Dark Ambient. Nurse with Wound debuted two years after Throbbing Gristle, incorporating Musique Concrète with numerous surrealist influences over time. Current 93 eventually transitioned from nightmare-inducing drones and chants into a form of lilting acoustic music which would become known as "Apocalyptic Folk". These bands made little direct impact on the future Industrial genre (Coil's early albums being an exception), although there is a certain degree of fan overlap.
As the genre kept evolving, it began adding elements from other genres and/or recombining with various forms of itself. Bill Leeb, an early member of Skinny Puppy, tamed his former group's bizarre experimentalism by building his songs around an EBM backbone and going all-out Cyberpunk in attitude. Albums from his project Front Line Assembly, particularly Tactical Neural Implant, have often been considered landmarks in the genre.
The EBM faction of the genre kept making itself progressively Darker and Edgier, sometimes increasing the tempo and toughening up the drums whenever possible. The project Leaether Strip (misspelling deliberate) embodies this trend pretty well.
Naturally, the dark, chaotic lyrics and sound of Industrial music caused it to acquire a fanbase within the goth community and it didn't take too long for stylistic blending to occur. Industrial was already pretty Dark and Edgy, but when some very depressed Germans decided to goth it up (influenced by a gothic-inspired form of Synth-Pop known as Dark Wave), it became Nightmare Fuel. The project :wumpscut: took this to potentially Wangsty extremes: their album Embryodead is a Concept Album which argues that it is better to die in the womb than to be born in this cruel and miserable world full of hate and beyond reason. Needless to say, it isn't the most pleasant listen for most audiences.
Of course, this new audience opened up a new marketing opportunity for many Industrial bands, leading to an increasing focus on making successful dance-floor hits for goths. The more mainstream Industrial groups (for a given value of mainstream) progressively incorporated influences from pop-based dance genres. Trance became a significant influence (though admittedly, Electronic Body Music can at times sound like Darker and Edgier Trance, so it wasn't a particularly huge deviation from established norms), something which resulted in the rise of a Sub-Genre called "Futurepop". Bands that pioneered this style include VNV Nation (whose album Empires is the Trope Codifier for Futurepop), Icon of Coil and Apoptygma Berzerk.
A less dance-friendly fringe style known as Noise later appeared as a reaction against Futurepop and an attempt to remove any and all mainstream elements form industrial and focus solely on the abrasiveness. Noise mostly consists of loud electronic samples brickwalled and distorted in order to inflict pain upon the audience. If there are any lyrics then they're usually angry, offensive and violent. Merzbow is the most recognizable name among fans of Noise music.
Members of the subculture that arose from the Industrial scene became known as "rivet-heads", and adopted a militaristic dress code. Unsurprisingly, rivet-heads got on supremely well with goths, due in no small part to their shared love of Industrial and Industrial-related styles. Fans who fall somewhere between rivet-head and goth are often referred to as "cybergoths".
As of the writing of this page, Industrial music has entered a period of stagnation, with two main sub-genres/derivative genres retaining some level of popularity - the remnants of the Futurepop acts that are sliding into synthpop and/or more retro forms of electronic music, and the Darker and Edgier "Hellektro" or “Aggrotech” (essentially really, really hard EBM, sometimes with insanely angry and/or miserable attitudes and sometimes without) acts like Combichrist and Psyclon Nine. This is, of course, a simplification, and many artists can be found that defy this basic characterization, but it certainly applies to the majority of the Industrial that gets played at most goth clubs these days. Several older Industrial Dance songs sometimes get spun in clubs as part of '80s nights, due to their compatibility with the format; it helps that Alternative Dance bands like Depeche Mode incorporated conspicuous industrial elements into their sound as a means of distinguishing themselves from more traditional Synth-Pop (for instance, compare "Shake the Disease" to Ministry's "Every Day is Halloween", or Nine Inch Nails' Pretty Hate Machine to DM's Music for the Masses; Trent Reznor even cited Depeche Mode's Black Celebration as a major influence on Pretty Hate Machine).
While the Industrial genre itself may be developing a bit of rust on its rivets, modern movements like Dubstep, Harsh Noise, and Glitch owe a debt to the pioneers who discovered the art creating emotionally charged music from controlled chaos and many artists in these genres cite Industrial groups as a major influence.
Not to be confused with Industrial Metal (the genre into which bands like Ministry, Rammstein, Nine Inch Nails, and KMFDM fall), which is the result of bands combining elements of industrial music with metal. See that genre's page for more detail.
Industrial acts and creators, categorized by subgenre:
- Author And Punisher (mixed with drone metal, power noise and Industrial Metal, notable for using entirely electronic instrumentation)
- 23 Skidoo (Also Post-Punk)
- Babyland (Much newer than most examples here, but their style is a rough fit)
- Bourbonese Qualk
- Cabaret Voltaire (Trope Makers; later on changed to EBM, then to House Music)
- Chrome (The lesser-known Trope Maker)
- Clock DVA (Later on became EBM/Electro-Industrial)
- Controlled Bleeding (The avant-garde precursor to the marriage between Goth and Industrial; extremely unpredictable)
- Cop Shoot Cop (Also Noise Rock)
- Daughters
- 2018 - You Won't Get What You Want
- Deliriant Mutant
- Der Plan (Also Post-Punk and New Wave Music)
- Die Haut
- Die Tödliche Doris
- Einstürzende Neubauten
- Esplendor Geométrico
- Factrix
- Foetus
- Laibach (Also the Trope Maker of Martial)
- Leather Nun (Among other things...)
- Merzbow (Also the Trope Maker for Harsh Noise)
- Missing Foundation
- Monte Cazzaza
- Nervous Gender (Trope Maker)
- Nocturnal Emissions
- Nurse with Wound
- P16.D4
- Iggy Pop:
- 1977 - The Idiot (often considered an Ur-Example of the genre, released the same year as Throbbing Gristle's debut)
- Lou Reed:
- 1975 - Metal Machine Music (Often considered an Ur-Example of this and Harsh Noise)
- Boyd Rice (A.k.a. NON; the other other Trope Maker)
- Severed Heads
- SPK
- Mark Stewart And The Mafia (sometimes mixed with Post-punk and sometimes dub. Possible Ur-Example of Industrial Hip Hop)
- Suicide (Ur-Example)
- Swans (Up to Children Of God; foreshadowed Industrial Metal)
- Test Dept
- This Heat (a Genre-Busting experimental band who helped to pioneer the genre)
- Throbbing Gristle (First Trope Maker, usually considered the Ur-Example)
- Coil (Early on, mostly)
- Psychic TV (Though they're also Genre-Busting, as well)
- Yello (mainly on their first three albums and on much of their fourth; later material would lean increasingly away from industrial in favor of other Electronic Music genres)
- Z'ev (Yet another Trope Maker)
- à;GRUMH...
- And One (Early albums only; later work is Futurepop)
- Armageddon Dildos
- A Split-Second
- Auto Aggression
- BiGod20
- Borghesia
- Cabaret Voltaire (Their mid-period work was one of the Trope Makers; later became House Music)
- Chris And Cosey
- ClockDVA (On later albums)
- The Crystalline Effect
- D.A.F. (Trope Makers and possible Ur-Example)
- DIVE!! (Noisier than most, an influence on Power Noise)
- Die Krupps (Early work; later on, they were Trope Makers for Neue Deutsche Härte)
- Die Warzau
- Front 242 (Perhaps the definitive EBM group and the Trope Namer as well)
- KMFDM (Later work is Industrial Metal, but their early works fall here)
- Laibach (Their later albums combine this with Martial)
- Liasons Dangerouses (Ur-Example, arguably)
- Ministry (On Twitch and the contemporaneous singles only- early work was Synth-Pop, later work Industrial Metal)
- The Neon Judgement (Also Synth-Pop and New Wave Music)
- Nitzer Ebb
- Orange Sector (New-ish band, old style)
- Portion Control (Trope Maker, alongside D.A.F.)
- Pouppee Fabrikk
- Schnitt Acht
- Spetsnaz (Like Orange Sector, a new band playing classic EBM)
- Vomito Negro
- Angels And Agony
- And One (On their later albums)
- Apoptygma Berserk (Invented the genre on their first few albums, later became Alternative Dance.)
- Assemblage 23
- Ayria (later albums are more Electro-Industrial)
- Blume
- Covenant (Not to be confused with the Black Metal band formerly of the same name)
- Culture Kultur
- Frozen Plasma
- Informatik
- Interface
- Imperative Reaction
- Information Society
- Massiv In Mensch
- Midnight Resistance (first album; his second is more Dark Wave)
- mind.in.a.box
- Neuroticfish
- Noxious Emotion (With a prominent Electro-Industrial influence)
- Seabound
- SITD
- System Syn (Albeit with some Electro-Industrial influences)
- T.O.Y.
- VNV Nation (Trope Codifier)
- XP8
- 32Crash (also EBM)
- Abbey Nex (also Industrial Metal)
- Alter Der Ruine (Also Power Noise and, sometimes, Synth-Pop)
- amGod
- Angelspit
- Emilie Autumn (Victorian/violin/gothic industrial, she also falls under Dark Cabaret and Industrial Metal at times.)
- Chant
- Cenobita
- Combichrist (One of the most successful Aggrotech groups, would switch to straight-up Industrial Metal on We Love You)
- Covenant (First two albums, after which they became one of the figureheads of the Futurepop subgenre, as mentioned above)
- Cylab
- Das Ich (A Trope Maker for Dark Wave / Industrial crossover bands)
- Decoded Feedback
- Ego Likeness
- The Electric Hellfire Club
- Everything Goes Cold
- Fockewolf (also Dark Wave)
- Forma Tadre
- Front Line Assembly (Trope Maker and Trope Codifier for the EBM-based, Cyberpunk influenced variation of the genre, and one of the subgenre's longest-lasting groups)
- Funker Vogt
- Peter Gabriel (provided the Ur-Example with his fourth album, before diving into the sound more thoroughly on Up)
- Garbage (Occaionally touch on this genre)
- Gesaffelstein (mixed with electro, shifted away from the style with Hyperion before dipping into it once again with GAMMA)
- God Module
- Grendel
- Haujobb (Trope Codifier for the genre in the '90s)
- HEALTH (mixed with Noise Rock starting with Death Magic)
- Hocico
- IAMX
- Implant
- Kevorkian Death Cycle (Sometimes Industrial Metal)
- Kidneythieves (Also Industrial Metal)
- The Klinik (Another Trope Maker)
- Laibach
- Leaetherstrip (Arguably the Ur-Example for the Hellektro subgenre)
- Les Friction
- Meat Beat Manifesto (Another Trope Maker, and an odd, eclectic example; also Industrial Hip-Hop)
- Mentallo And The Fixer
- Microchip League
- Nachtmahr
- Numb
- Perturbator Originally cyberpunk influenced synthwave, added a heavy dose of industrial starting with New Model and Lustful Sacraments.
- Placebo Effect
- Pop1280 (combined with Noise Rock)
- Project Pitchfork (Also Dark Wave, and perhaps a Trope Codifier for Dark Wave-influenced Industrial)
- Psyborg Corp
- Psyclon Nine (Later albums like Order of the Shadow also have a heavy Black Metal influence)
- Pulse Legion
- Razed In Black (Borders on Industrial Metal, but doesn't quite make it)
- Santa Hates You (The other band that Project Pitchfork's Peter Spilles is a part of)
- SITD (combined with Futurepop)
- Skinny Puppy (Trope Maker and possibly Ur-Example for Electro-Industrial as a whole)
- Download
- Spahn Ranch
- Sister Machine Gun
- Skyla Vertex
- SKYND
- Sleep Chamber
- Street Sects (one of the acts more outwardly influenced by noise music, also Punk Rock and plunderphonics)
- Suicide Commando (Trope Codifier for the Hellektro subgenre)
- Surveillance (Side project of the aforementioned Assemblage 23)
- Velvet Acid Christ
- ± The Violen[t] Vocation[s] ±
- Virtual Embrace
- :wumpscut: (Trope Codifier for goth-influenced industrial)
- X-Fusion
- X Marks The Pedwalk
- Yeht Mae
- yelworC (Trope Maker for Dark Electro)
- Youth Code
- 1 800 PAIN
- Acumen Nation
- Allflaws (also Trip Hop)
- Amelia Arsenic
- Antipop Consortium
- Backxwash
- B L A C K I E
- Blades Of Hades / Blades
- The Bug (a.k.a. Kevin Martin)
- Chino Amobi (is this with elements of post-industrial, Harsh Noise and Alternative R&B)
- clipping.
- Consolidated (Trope Codifier)
- Corporate Avenger
- Curse Of The Golden Vampire (A collaboration between Alec Empire and Techno Animal)
- Dälek (Along with lots of other things)
- The Damage Manual
- Dana Dentata
- Death Grips
- Disposable Heroes Of Hip Hocrisy
- Dizzee Rascal (early material, has since then settled into grime)
- Faderhead (also Electro-Industrial and Futurepop)
- Food for Animals
- Ghostemane (also trap, Soundcloud rap and Black Metal)
- Ho99o9 (Also Horrorcore)
- JPEGMafia (also Alternative Hip Hop)
- Keith Le Blanc (mainly overlapping with Tackhead)
- Kompressor (A parody act)
- The Mad Capsule Markets (also Industrial Metal and Hardcore Punk)
- Mark Stewart+Mafia (Crosses over with Dub, possible Ur-Example)
- Marz
- Meat Beat Manifesto (Not all the time, but often enough; also Electro-Industrial)
- Moodie Black
- Necro Facility (combined with Futurepop)
- Renegade Soundwave (With distinct Dub influences as well, also considered Alternative Dance and an Ur-Example of Trip Hop)
- Saul Williams (Also Spoken Word and Alternative Rap; known for working with Trent Reznor)
- Scarlxrd (also nu metal and trap)
- Sounds Of Mass Production (Combined with Industrial Metal)
- Steril (With Electro-Industrial elements)
- Stromkern (Combined with Futurepop)
- Swervy
- Tackhead (Consists of many of the same personnel as Mark Stewart+Mafia above; also Post-Punk)
- Techno Animal (one of Justin Broadrick's many projects over the years)
- Kanye West (on Yeezus)
- Big Black (another possible Ur-Example)
- 1987 - Songs About Fucking
- Black Light Burns
- David Bowie:
- 1995 - Outside
- 1997 - Earthling (overlaps with Drum and Bass and Techno)
- BUCK-TICK
- Deadsy
- Die Krupps
- Front Line Assembly
- Killing Joke
- KMFDM
- Marilyn Manson (Trope Codifier alongside Nine Inch Nails)
- 1994 - Portrait of an American Family
- 1995 - Smells Like Children
- 1996 - Antichrist Superstar
- 2000 - Holy Wood (In the Shadow of the Valley of Death)
- Mindless Self Indulgence
- Mortiis (After being dark ambient, and then borderline Synth-Pop)
- Nine Inch Nails (Trope Codifier alongside Marilyn Manson)
- 1989 - Pretty Hate Machine
- 1992 - Broken
- 1994 - The Downward Spiral
- 1999 - The Fragile
- 2005 - With Teeth
- 2007 - Year Zero
- 2008 - The Slip
- 2013 - Hesitation Marks
- Pop Will Eat Itself
- Akira Yamaoka (sometimes...)
- Autopsia
- Black Rain
- Coil (Moved into this territory later on- early work mostly falls into the Old-School Industrial category)
- Chino Amobi (is this with elements of industrial hip hop, Harsh Noise and Alternative R&B)
- Chu Ishikawa
- Current 93 (Trope Makers for Ambient-Industrial, later moved more into Neo-Folk territory)
- Death in June (Trope Makers for the Neo-Folk-influenced fringe of the genre)
- Der Blutharsch (Also Martial)
- Hafler Trio (Falls somewhere between Old-School Industrial and this)
- How to Destroy Angels (Trent Reznor's side project)
- Trent Reznor's soundtrack collaborations with Atticus Ross fall here as well.
- In Slaughter Natives (Also Martial)
- In The Nursery (Trope Codifier for the subgenre that combines this with Classical)
- Juan Mutant (The heavier moments on 22/08/69)
- Lab Report (Side project of Pigface One of the Trope Makers for Ambient-Industrial / Dark Ambient)
- The Legendary Pink Dots
- Les Joyaux de la Princesse (Combined with Martial)
- Lilith
- Long Distance Poison
- Lustmord
- The Moon Lay Hidden Beneath a Cloud (Also Martial)
- Mark Morgan (Especially his soundtracks to the first two Fallout games)
- Nine Inch Nails (Usually Industrial Metal, but some of their work, especially Ghosts I-IV, falls into this category)
- 1994 - The Downward Spiral
- 1996 - Quake soundtrack
- 2007 - Year Zero
- Nothing But Noise (Side project of Front 242 founding members Daniel B. and Dirk Bergen)
- Gary Numan (from Sacrifice onward, combined with Dark Wave)
- Nurse with Wound (Mostly their later works)
- PGR
- Psychic TV (Arguable Trope Maker for the Post-Industrial side of things, due to their eclecticism.)
- REPULSIVE
- Robin Rimbaud
- Rome (Combined with Martial)
- These New Puritans
- Xiu Xiu (also experimental rock)
- Zoviet France (Trope Makers for Industrial-Ambient. Well known for their unconventional album packaging.)
- ACTUS
- Ain Soph
- Allerseelen
- Autarky
- Der Blutharsch (Also Ambient-Industrial and Post-Industrial)
- Derniere Volante
- Die Weisse Rose
- Douglas P
- In Slaughter Natives (Also Ambient-Industrial)
- Krępulec
- Kriegsfall-U
- Laibach (Trope Makers, mostly on the early albums- later works combine this with EBM)
- Les Joyaux de la Princesse (Combined with Post-Industrial)
- The Moon Lay Hidden Beneath a Cloud (Also Post-Industrial and Ambient-Industrial)
- Parzival
- Toroidh
- Triangular Ascension
- Turbund Sturmwerk
- Von Thronstahl (Notably the only Industrial band to ever actually espouse fascism)
- Wappenbund
- Westwind
- Woodkid (mixed with Baroque Pop)
- Adam X
- Alter Der Ruine (Also Electro-Industrial and, sometimes, Synth-Pop)
- Antigen Shift
- Asche
- Axiome
- Black Lung
- Blackhouse (very rare Christian example; also Dark Ambient and Power Electronics)
- C/A/T
- Converter
- DIVE!! (A Ur-Example)
- Dreamcrusher
- Drillbit
- Dulce Liquido (Combined with Aggrotech)
- Endif
- Esplendour Geometrico (A definite Ur-Example, but usually considered Old-School Industrial)
- Feindflug
- Fractured Transmission
- Hypnoskull
- Imminent
- Mono No Aware
- Morgenstern
- Noisex (Trope Makers and Trope Namers)
- P.A.L.
- Orphx
- The Peoples Republic Of Europe
- Prospero
- Sonar
- Synapscape
- Tarmvred
- Terrorfakt
- XOTOX
- Aelia Capitolina
- Anenzephilia
- Atrax Morgue
- The Body (On recent tours, earlier work is Avant-Garde Metal)
- Brighter Death Now (Trope Makers for Death Industrial)
- Caustic
- Dead Man's Hill
- Deathpile
- Hieronymous Bosch
- Genocide Organ
- Limbs Bin
- Lingua Ignota (also neoclassical)
- Mauthausen Orchestra
- Murder Corporation
- Narkoleptik
- Pharmakon
- Philip Best (Consumer Electronics)
- Ramleh (Initially this, later Noise Rock — always terrifying)
- Stratvm Terror
- Sutcliffe Jügend
- Whitehouse (Trope Maker, Trope Namer and Trope Codifier)
- Wolf Eyes
This genre contains examples of:
- Alt-itis: Many artists take on different projects to experiment with different styles. Sometimes, these side-projects end up outshining the original while other times, they are quickly forgotten about.
- Jan Loamfield's most popular project is the power noise project Noisuf-X but his first project, which followed his harsh-EBM project X-Fusion. He has also dabbled in more EDM-like sounds in Stoppenberg.
- Vasi Vallis is mostly involved in the synthpop/futurepop projects Frozen Plasma and Namnambulu. He is also known for his EBM and industrial dance music project Reaper.
- Nachmahr's Thomas Rainer was originally better known for his role in the darkwave duo project L'Âme Immortelle.
- Sebastian Komor has been involved in a variety of projects including Komor Kommando, Icon of Coil, Zombie Girl (Since 2005), Bruderschaft, Monofader.
- Creator Couple: Present in Chris & Cosey (Chris Carter and Cosey Tutti Fanni) and Coil (Jhonn Balance and Peter Christopherson), among others.
- Cyberpunk: A frequent mood/aesthetic the genre aims for. Tactical Neural Implant and Hard Wired by Front Line Assembly are classic examples, other examples include Buried Dreams by Clock DVA, Harsh Generation by Grendel and Serenity Is The Devil by Icon Of Coil.
- Cyber Punk Is Techno: Frequently used in Cyberpunk media as a soundtrack and Industrial has drawn on the literature and movies significantly.
- Darker and Edgier: Compared to New Wave, Industrial is much darker in terms of both lyrical content and sound. The genre itself became darker and edgier over time, with the evolution of subgeneres like Harsh Noise.
- Everything Is an Instrument: Synths, violins, drums, tambourines, bells, guitars, pipes, bones, jackhammers, televisions, and whatever the musicians can play...
- Exactly What It Says on the Tin: The Rhythmic Noise (or Powernoise) movement. Harsh noises set to a beat.
- Fan Disservice: When an Industrial song features sexual content, expect it to be less Intercourse with You and more violent and disturbing. Throbbing Gristle's "Persuasion", about a reluctant young woman being forced to undress for a rich and powerful pervert, from the pervert's perspective, is a good example.
- Fanservice: Very frequently plays to the fetishes. Especially in Leaetherstrip's songs like "Strap Me Down".
- Fetish:
- Where to begin? Strap Me Down? Catharsis (Heal Me; Control Me)? Andy LaPlegua jumping around in skin tight latex and rubber? The outfits of the Target Audience?
- On the more extreme end, often bordering on Fan Disservice, Fetish Retardant, or even Nausea Fuel, some of the very earliest Industrial lyrics are only sexual in the most repellent and bizarre ways possible (Cabaret Voltaire's "Bedtime Stories").
- Thomas Rainer's predilection for women in military uniforms is well known. Artwork for Nachmahr often showcases uniformed women and Mädchen in Uniform is a song basically about why he loves them. Fans usually show up wearing uniforms too.
- Gorn: Very, very common lyrically. Throbbing Gristle, for instance, gave us such tunes as "Hamburger Lady" (about a woman who has been so horrifically burned that she resembles raw hamburger meat) and "Slug Bait" (which describes a Traumatic C-Section). Many music videos, as well; "Testure" by Skinny Puppy is but one example, with scenes of a man being subjected to bloody laboratory torture, intercut with real footage from a PETA documentary about lab animal abuse.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners:
- Most non-solo projects are very... close partnerships.
- Though averted in the case of Coil, who were actually a couple for a long period of time.
- I Am the Band: Many solo projects exist in the genre.
- Improv: A typical compositional technique, especially for the more experimental acts. Live performances of certain Throbbing Gristle songs could go on for much longer than their album length, with one performance of "Discipline" lasting half an hour.
- Intercourse with You: Many, although much of the subject matter of the lyrics doesn't deal with sex inasmuch fetish.
- Lighter and Softer: Particularly with the Futurepop subgenre, which is more melodic, follows a more conventional songwriting structure, and is in general more accessible.
- Loudness War: Intentionally invoked by some artists in the genre's early days, to get a more abrasive, less polished sound. The Hellectro subgenre invokes this too, as one of the ways it set itself apart from EBM.
- Madness Mantra: Many songs. Nine Inch Nails is particularly fond of this.
- Mind Rape: What some of the songs in the genre can induce. especially power electronics
- Misogyny Song: Most of the oeuvre of Power Electronics acts, especially Whitehouse, Sutcliffe Jügend, Snuff, RxAxPxE, and Taint.
- Music to Invade Poland to: EBM bands especially, but the whole genre has been accused of promoting Nazism at times. Partly because the logo of Industrial Records was the outline of Auschwitz. Subverted in that the logo was an attempt to identify modern life at large with industrialised mass murder.
- Averted by Die Krupps, who are very vocal in their anti-Nazi views.
- Played unfortunately straight with Von Thronstahl.
- Martial Industrial invokes this trope.
- A favourite Flame Bait around Nachtmahr is whether Thomas Rainer is a Neo-Nazi or not. The perception is not helped by his extremely militaristic stylings, his somewhat tongue-in-cheek Cult of Personality as the "Supreme Commander" and his very clear love for uniforms.
- Obligatory Bondage Song: Bondage imagery often shows up in songs, but is not always meant to be taken literally. Sometimes, bondage is a metaphor (like "Happiness in Slavery" by Nine Inch Nails, which is actually about the music industry); other times, it seems to be the point of a song, but the lyrics are to abstract to tell, like with Cabaret Voltaire's "Whip Blow".
- Ominous Music Box Tune:
- Listen to Stillbirth on Embryodead by :wumpscut:. You will never, ever, ever be able to listen to "London Bridge Is Falling Down" ever again.
- KMFDM tried their hand at this with "The Death and Burial of C.R.". There is also the opening to "Day of Light".
- Protest Song: A common theme, as the musicians channel their anger into causes important to them. Skinny Puppy, for instance, made animal rights a major theme of their lyrics in the 1980s, with songs like "Testure" decrying Animal Testing (the song samples dialogue from The Plague Dogs, no less).
- Sampling: Lots and lots of sampling. Best examples include Skinny Puppy's "Worlock", sampling Charles Manson singing The Beatles' "Helter Skelter", C/A/T's "Enhancer" sampling dialogue from Curb Your Enthusiasm about boobs, and Suicide Commando's "Bind, Torture, Kill" sampling news reports on serial killer Dennis Rader.
- The Ur-Example of the trope's use in the genre is probably the first disc of Cabaret Voltaire's compilation Methodology, whose material stretches back as far as early 1974.
- Religion Rant Song: Extremely common. Some bands, like Vigilante, make this their entire schtick, and most bands will have at least one. Nine Inch Nails has "Heresy", for example, the chorus of which loudly proclaims that "Your god is dead, and no one cares!" (It doubles as a Protest Song, as Trent Reznor wrote it out of anger at conservative Christians who said AIDS was divine punishment for homosexuality.)
- Sensory Abuse: Distortion, feedback, backmasking, Scare Chords, samples from horror films-Industrial artists always find a way to freak out their listeners. Common in both the music and fairly often the live shows as well. In particular, Throbbing Gristle, Einstürzende Neubauten, and Skinny Puppy are all well known for this in concert. Unsurprising, considering that many of the early artists in the genre had roots in performance art.
- Silly Love Songs: Often subverted. This genre's examples of love songs are things like Love Breeds Suicide by Suicide Commando and Strap Me Down by Leaether Strip (it's romantic! really!). However, sometimes this is played straight, for instance the Futurepop song Beloved by VNV Nation, or on Throbbing Gristle's (ambiguously sarcastic/serious) Synth-Pop anthem "United".
- Tear Jerker: Yes, even industrial can have Tear Jerker moments, such as Throbbing Gristle's suicide themed "Weeping," but a more modern one would be the song "My Crutch" from rhythmic noise band Caustic. Despite the band's motto (and debut album title) being "Booze up and Riot!" My Crutch is a stripped down, guitar and vox song with the singer describing how his alcoholism ruins his life and how he must quit drinking to save his marriage and his life. Also, Laibach did a mashup of the Israeli and Palestinian national anthems on their album Volk, in an attempt to show that the two warring peoples aren't so different after all. Hell, even Power Electronics has this in the form of Con-Dom's How Welcome Is Death To I Who Have Nothing More To Do But Die, which speaks candidly and frankly of the waking nightmare that is neurodegenerative illness, as well as the feelings that go through the heads of patients' loved ones.
- The very first AIDS benefit was Coil recording "Tainted Love" as a pitched-down dirge- recognizably the same song, but dreary and wretched instead of upbeat. The result is remarkable.
- This Is Your Premise on Drugs: The first album of Skinny Puppy was essentially 80's Synth-Pop on drugs. Quite literally, given Skuppy's compositional techniques.
- Trash-Can Band: Certain Old-School Industrial bands like Test Dept. and Einstürzende Neubauten are this in part. More recent Industrial groups usually just use samples of such sounds (when they're desired at all, anyways).
- True Art Is Angsty: Where to begin?!?! From concept albums about babies that die in the womb to concept albums about serial killers to songs about the Columbine massacre to bands whose entire act is about bashing Christianity to songs about animal vivisection, and these are just the examples I can think of off the top of my head.
- The thesis of the chapter on First-Wave Industrial in Simon Reynolds' epic Post-Punk tome Rip It Up and Start Again is that the very underlying premise of the genre is Psychedelic Rock Gone Horribly Wrong. His argument is extremely convincing.
- One of Einstürzende Neubauten's most compelling songs is "Yü-Gung (Fütter Mein Ego)," which is a lengthy ode to speed induced megalomania.
- World of Ham: The bands are populated by large hams and weirdos writing anvilicious, insane, shocking, drug-fueled, scary, and wangsty lyrics, giving theatrical and offensive performances while barraging and bukakke-ing the listener with loud and scary noises, infectuous dance rythyms, and the occasional metal guitar. This genre is a great example of how strange music and art can get.
Examples of Industrial songs:
- 1 800 PAIN - HURT (industrial hip-hop)
- 32Crash - Neighbours (electro-industrial)
- Angelspit - Vena Cava (electro-industrial)
- Author & Punisher - Terrorbird (power noise)
- Auto Aggression - The Sky Is Not Yours (EBM)
- Ayria - Analog Trash (futurepop)
- Backxwash - Don't Come To The Woods (industrial hip-hop)
- Cabaret Voltaire - Sensoria (old-school industrial)
- Chino Amobi - Eigengrau (Children of Hell II) (industrial hip-hop)
- clipping. - Story 2 (industrial hip-hop)
- Combichrist - This Is My Rifle (aggrotech)
- Converter - Error (power noise)
- Covenant - Call The Ships To Port (futurepop)
- Death Grips - Hacker (industrial hip-hop)
- Death in June - Rose Clouds of Holocaust (ambient industrial)
- Deathpile - Addicted (power electronics)
- Devilman - Noise Step (power noise)
- Front 242 - Headhunter V1.0 (EBM)
- Front Line Assembly - Mindphaser (electro-industrial)
- Funker Vogt - Maschine Zeit (aggrotech)
- Genocide Organ - Vive la Guerre (death industrial)
- Gesaffelstein - Hate or Glory (electro-industrial)
- HEALTH - Stonefist (electro-industrial)
- Hocico - Tiempos de Furia (aggrotech)
- How to Destroy Angels - A Drowning (post-industrial)
- HyperSonic - Desert Dazzle Bad Future US (Remaster) (futurepop)
- JPEGMAFIA - Baby I'm Bleeding (industrial hip-hop)
- KIKIYAMA - Number World (ambient-industrial)
- Laibach - The Whistleblowers (martial industrial)
- Leæther Strip - Don't Tame Your Soul (electro-industrial)
- Lingua Ignota - The Order of Spiritual Virgins (power electronics)
- Lustmord - Goetia (ambient industrial)
- mind.in.a.box - Identity (futurepop)
- Nitzer Ebb - Let Your Body Learn (EBM)
- Noisex - Rhythm Age (Help Me Out) (electro-industrial)
- Perturbator - Death of the Soul (electro-industrial)
- Psyclon Nine - Flesh Harvest (aggrotech)
- Scarlxrd - 6 Feet (industrial hip-hop)
- Skinny Puppy - Worlock (electro-industrial)
- Slipknot - (515) (power electronics)
- SPK - Slogun (power electronics)
- Street Sects - Our Lesions (electro-industrial)
- Suicide Commando - Die Motherfucker Die (aggrotech)
- Terrorfakt - Ich (power noise)
- Throbbing Gristle - What A Day (old-school industrial)
- Whitehouse - Wriggle Like a Fucking Eel (power electronics)
- Woodkid - Run Boy Run (martial industrial)
- Xiu Xiu - Girl with Basket of Fruit (post-industrial)
- Xotox - [Xo]toxic (power noise)
- Youth Code - For I Am Cursed (EBM)