My review of this year's Sonar festival is now online. Although there were some great performances they were stranded in a sea of mediocrity and complacent regression. See Trebuchet for the full story.
Montage by Vera Bremerton. Next Friday I'll give an experimental presentation at Noise=Noise on the strange parallels between the sonic and conceptual dystopianism of Doctor Who and first generation British industrial music. Dr. Who exposed mass audiences (often very young) to a combination of experimental electronic sound and dystopian themes, a combination that could also summarise industrial music. Dr. Who frequently presented post-apocalyptic scenarios of mutation, mind control and para-militarised societies and, in the process, at least implicitly criticised actual political and technological developments of the time, particularly those associated with the Cold War arms race. Due to budgetary constraints these visionary scenarios were often realised in a rudimentary ad hoc fashion; an approach that also applies to industrial. The early industrial groups highlighted the most serious social and political themes using very primitive electronic equipment, creating a kind of...
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