Industrial Fist,/em> is artist Seth Price's tribute to the slack middle period of industrial music: not so much a genre proper as a constellation of overlapping styles: 'Industrial Dance,' 'Industrial Synth,' 'Electronic Body Music,' 'New Beat,' 'Charcoal Beat,' and 'Torture Tech.' Most popular between 1983 and 1989, the music is now widely reviled for its simple beats and outdated sounds. It has been overshadowed by pioneering early works from 1970s Industrial pioneers such as Throbbing Gristle, as well as later popularizers such as Nine Inch Nails. Industrial Fist recoups the sounds of failure in a continuous remix that touches on well-known groups such as Front Line Assembly, Revolting Cocks, and Skinny Puppy, as well as lesser-knowns like Manufacture, and completely forgotten outfits like Lab Death and Kill Control.

CD

New York State $8.90 Non-New York State $8.50 International $11.00

Cassette (limited Edition)

New York State $16.46 Non-New York State $15.50 International $18.00

This album is the third in Price's Distributed History project, which uses the mix-tape form to examine the just-past, putting pop’s cast-offs to work in order to sketch a redemptive cultural history. There are lessons to learn from the dead ends. Other tapes include New Jack Swing (free103point9 Audio Dispatch 021), a reappraisal of that genre, and Game Heaven (2001), a collection of early video game soundtracks which debuted at the Whitney Museum store during the 2002 Whitney Biennial, in which Price participated. With each mix-tape, Price publishes an essay outlining the genre in question and placing it in historical perspective (an essay on Industrial Synth music appears in Sound Collector Audio Review #4, due out in December 2003).