As that line from that New Model Army song goes:
“Lets take a walk, out by the chemical works,
where the sky glows green at night”
When I think about industry as an inspiration it is the image of dark satanic mills, factories, power stations and chemical plants pumping dark smoke into a grey wet sky I am thinking about. Why I like this image I’m not sure … I can be a bit of hippy at heart … but I think it is probably the desolation of the image that does it for me, appealing to my misathropic and pessimistic side.
I do actually like and am interested in the steampunk look and creations but it’s not really me. Too much brass polish. I could maybe be do the next phase of steampunk, the neglected decaying remains of factories where the work has been off-shored in search of ever cheaper labour, or stereotypical soviet steampunk, sub-standard machines churning out sub-standard goods …
… on a bit of a tangent, I feel that the more advanced and better a techonoloy is, the harder it is to feel any romantic connection to it, the less easy it is to feel creatively inspired by it … would rather sit and watch steam engines pumping away than internal combustion engines, would rather watch internal combustion engines than electric motors … and so on. Objectivity is required to drive progress. …
… back on topic and still thinking about the Soviet Union I also find old-school communist and socialist propaganda imagery to be very powerful and creatively inspiring. As with my heavily polluting noisy factory it is the image rather than the reality I like.
The images of industry I see as a potential to inspire and influence my music, link in closely with my politics, a simpler time, science and engineering and desolate landscapes inspirations that I have either already mentioned or will do shortly … but would any industrial influence be obvious in my music? Probably not, I think the term industrial implies intense, noisy and repetitive music. I do enjoy listening to bands in this vein, already labeled as industrial music, but I think I probably too laid back and mellow to pull this off convincingly myself.
Having said that the musical project I am currently working on, when I stop procrastinating for a few moments, could certainly be said to be inspired by modern industry. Automatic and computer controlled.
