Electronic body music

Electronic body music (EBM) is a music genre that combines elements of industrial music and electronic punk music.

Emerging in the early-to-mid 1980s, the genre's early influences range from the industrial music of the time (Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire), European electropunk (DAF, Liaisons Dangereuses, Portion Control) and straight-ahead electronic music (Kraftwerk).

In the 1990s, the usage of the term widened to include artists influenced by other styles such as synthpop and trance.

History

Early EBM

The term Electronic body music was coined by the Belgian band Front 242 in 1984 to describe the music ^*) of their EP No Comment, released in the same year. A few years before, DAF from Germany used the term "Körpermusik" (body music) to descibe their dancable electronic sound. Another term that has been used to refer to EBM is "Aggrepo" (aggressive pop, mainly used in Germany in the late '80s).

Through the 1980s and early 1990s the style was characterized by hard and often sparse dancable electronic beats, clear undistorted vocals, shouts or growls with reverberation and echo effects. EBM became popular in the underground club scene, particularly in Europe.

In this early period the most important labels were the Belgian PIAS, Antler-Subway and KK Records, the German Techno Drome International, Animalized and Zoth Ommog, the North American Wax Trax! and the Swedish Front Music Production and Energy (later Energy Rekords).

Early EBM acts besides Front 242 include Die Krupps, Nitzer Ebb, Force Dimension, Bigod 20, à;GRUMH..., Severed Heads, Signal Aout 42, Insekt and early Front Line Assembly. A few other groups are A Split Second (a Belgian electro-rock/new beat act), AAAK, The Weathermen, The Klinik (a Belgian post-industrial act), Borghesia, The Neon Judgement or Ministry. These acts produced some EBM-typical songs, although they were not EBM groups.

Older style EBM also had an influence on many New beat and Goa trance artists (e.g. Juno Reactor, Astral Projection, Eon Project).

Developments

By the early and the mid 1990s, EBM began to borrow more heavily from synthpop with the early releases of such bands as Leæther Strip, :wumpscut: or Plastic Noise Experience combining harsh distorted beats with synthesizer-driven melodies. This evolution of EBM has been termed by the music press and labels as hardcore electro or electro-industrial ^*, although many still refer to it as EBM or sometimes "new-school EBM" or especially in Germany and South America as elektro for short (not to be confused with the hip-hop subgenre electro). Other notable artists of this era include Allied Vision, Psychopomps, Controlled Fusion, early Decoded Feedback or NVMPH.

An outgrowth of this variation of harsh EBM that developed in the mid-/late-1990s and resurfaced more recently is aggrotech, also known as 'terror EBM', which combines the basics of electro-industrial with harsher song structures, aggressive lyrics and techno-influenced beats, usually distorted, of a militant, pessimistic or explicit nature. Some acts are Funker Vogt, Tactical Sekt, Hocico, newer Suicide Commando, Feindflug, Unter Null, Dismantled, and Velvet Acid Christ.

By the late 1990s a few bands (notably VNV Nation, Covenant, and Apoptygma Berzerk) were incorporating more influences from synthpop and trance. VNV's Ronan Harris and Apoptygma's Stephan Groth called this new style futurepop, a term now more widely used to describe their later music and that of similar groups.

Other more recent bands such as Ionic Vision, Spetsnaz or Proceed have gone the other way by producing older style EBM releases in the new millennium.