Grindcore is an extreme fusion genre of heavy metal and hardcore punk that originated in the mid-1980s, drawing inspiration from abrasive-sounding musical styles, such as thrashcore, crust punk, hardcore punk, extreme metal, and industrial. Grindcore is considered a more noise-filled style of hardcore punk while using hardcore's trademark characteristics such as heavily distorted, down-tuned guitars, grinding overdriven bass, high-speed tempo, blast beats, and vocals which consist of growls, shouts and high-pitched shrieks. Early groups like Napalm Death are credited with laying the groundwork for the style. It is most prevalent today in North America and Europe, with popular contributors such as Brutal Truth and Nasum. Lyrical themes range from a primary focus on social and political concerns, to gory subject matter and black humor.
Industrial rock is a fusion genre that fuses industrial music and rock music. It initially originated in the 1970s, and drew influence from early experimental and industrial acts such as Throbbing Gristle, Einstürzende Neubauten and Chrome. Industrial rock became more prominent in the 1980s with the success of artists such as Killing Joke, Swans, and partially Skinny Puppy, and later spawned the offshoot genre known as industrial metal. The genre was made more accessible to mainstream audiences in the 1990s with the aid of acts such as Nine Inch Nails and Marilyn Manson, both of which have released platinum-selling records.
Atari Teenage Riot (ATR) is a German band formed in Berlin in 1992. Highly political, they fuse left-wing, anarchist and anti-fascist views with punk vocals and a techno sound called digital hardcore, which is a term band member Alec Empire used as the name of his record label Digital Hardcore Recordings.
The Ataris are an American punk rock band from Anderson, Indiana. Formed in 1996, they released five studio albums between 1997 and 2007. Their best-selling album is So Long, Astoria (2003), which was certified gold. Their high-charting single is their cover of Don Henley's "The Boys of Summer" from So Long, Astoria. The only constant member throughout their history has been singer/songwriter/guitarist Kristopher "Kris" Roe.
Digital hardcore is a fusion genre that combines hardcore punk with electronic dance music genres such as breakbeat, techno, and drum and bass while also drawing on heavy metal and noise music. It typically features fast tempos and aggressive sound samples. The style was pioneered by Alec Empire of the German band Atari Teenage Riot during the early 1990s, and often has sociological or far-left lyrical themes.
Alec Empire is a German experimental electronic musician who is best known as a founding member of the band Atari Teenage Riot, as well as a solo artist, producer and DJ. He has released many albums, EPs and singles, some under aliases, and remixed over seventy tracks for various artists including Björk. He was also the driving force behind the creation of the digital hardcore genre, and founded the record labels Digital Hardcore Recordings and Eat Your Heart Out Records.
April Wine is a Canadian rock band formed in 1969 and based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Led by singer-guitarist-songwriter Myles Goodwyn from its inception in 1969 until his retirement in 2023, April Wine first experienced success with their second album, On Record (1972), which reached the top 40 in Canada and yielded two hit singles: "Bad Side of the Moon", a top 20 hit in Canada; and "You Could Have Been a Lady", a number 2 song in Canada.
Gauntlet II is a 1986 arcade game produced by Atari Games that serves as the immediate sequel to the original Gauntlet, which was released the previous year. Like its predecessor, Gauntlet II is a fantasy-themed top down dungeon crawler game and was released as a dedicated cabinet, as well as a conversion kit, both available in 2-player and 4-player versions.
Crust punk is a form of music influenced by English punk rock and extreme metal. The style, which evolved in the early 1980s in England, often has songs with dark and pessimistic lyrics that linger on political and social ills. The term "crust" was coined by Hellbastard on their 1986 Ripper Crust demo.
Post-hardcore is a punk rock music genre that maintains the aggression and intensity of hardcore punk but emphasizes a greater degree of creative expression. It was initially inspired by post-punk and noise rock. Like the term "post-punk", the term "post-hardcore" has been applied to a broad constellation of groups. Post-hardcore began in the 1980s with bands like Hüsker Dü and Minutemen. The genre expanded in the 1980s and 1990s with releases by bands from cities that had established hardcore scenes, such as Fugazi from Washington, D.C. as well as groups such as Big Black, Jawbox, Quicksand, and Shellac that stuck closer to post-hardcore's noise rock roots. Dischord Records became a major nexus of post-hardcore during this period. The genre also began to incorporate more dense, complex, and atmospheric instrumentals with bands like Slint and Unwound, and also experienced some crossover from indie rock with bands like The Dismemberment Plan. In the early- and mid-2000s, post-hardcore achieved mainstream success with the popularity of bands like At the Drive-In, My Chemical Romance, Dance Gavin Dance, AFI, Underoath, Hawthorne Heights, Silverstein, The Used, Saosin, Alexisonfire, and Senses Fail. In the 2010s, bands like Sleeping with Sirens and Pierce the Veil achieved mainstream success under the post-hardcore label. Meanwhile, bands like Title Fight and La Dispute experienced underground popularity playing music that bore a closer resemblance to the post-hardcore bands of the 1980s and 1990s.
Zach Sciacca, better known as DJ Z-Trip, is an American DJ and producer. He is a pioneer of the mashup movement.
Duchess Says is a Canadian punk band from Montreal. The band describes its genre as "moog rock", and is known for its large, loud and theatrical live shows.
Jack Rose was an American guitarist originally from Virginia and later based in Philadelphia. Rose is best known for his solo acoustic guitar work. He was also a member of the noise/drone band Pelt.
Pac-Man is a 1982 maze video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. under official license by Namco, and an adaptation of the 1980 hit arcade game of the same name. The player controls the title character, who attempts to consume all of the wafers while avoiding four ghosts that pursue him. Eating flashing wafers at the corners of the screen will cause the ghosts to turn temporarily blue and flee, allowing Pac-Man to eat them for bonus points.
Dim Mak Records is an independent, Los Angeles-based record label, events company, and lifestyle brand founded by Steve Aoki in 1996. The label has released music under the genres of punk, indie rock, hardcore, hip hop, and electronic dance music.
Black Moth Super Rainbow is an American psychedelic electronic indie rock band from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US. BMSR is a solo music project created by Thomas Fec, who is also known as Tobacco. Fec writes, records, and produces the work of BMSR independently. As a live performance it features members Tobacco whose vocals are altered via a vocoder, synth players The Seven Fields of Aphelion and Pony Diver, drummer Iffernaut, and bassist STV SLV.
Fuck Buttons was an electronic music duo formed in Bristol in 2004 by Andrew Hung and Benjamin John Power.
Crystal Castles is the debut studio album by Canadian electronic music duo Crystal Castles; at the time of its release, the group consisted of producer Ethan Kath and singer Alice Glass. The two met each other in 2004 and both had an interest in noise acts like AIDS Wolf & The Sick Lipstick. This inspired the two to start a project that made noise music, but instead of guitars, they would use electronic sounds made with a circuit-bent Atari 5200–which effectively led to the media pigeonholing the act as chiptune, despite the fact that the members themselves didn't deliberately intend this.
Atari Blitzkrieg, is a Virginia based American hip hop artist. He is known for his heavy use of alliteration, multi-syllabic rhyming schemes and incorporation of various genres into his music.
Christopher Lee Schamber, better known by his stage name Savage Sun, is an American rapper and hip hop recording artist from Stockton, California.
