8 Tracks: OF On-U Sound

Adrian met Daniel Miller back in the early days of the Rough Trade shop when he would be in there selling the latest reggae imports and Daniel was making music as The Normal and starting out with his Mute label. Invited by Daniel to remix Depeche Mode, Sherwood completely deconstructed the synth-pop of “People Are People” into the gibbering madness of “Are People People?”, and turned out this fast and raw version of “Master & Servant”, perfectly tooled for mid-80s alternative night club action. If tracks had a scent, then this remix would give off a mixture of leather and amyl nitrate. We also took the name of this mix for the excellent compilation that Trevor Jackson curated for us last year.

Early Neubauten is a brilliant mix of metal-bashing percussion, teutonic chant and extreme post-punk, and this 1985 fan favourite is a good example of how powerfully they could combine these elements. Also covered by confrontational NYC scum rockers Pussy Galore, the deployment of repetition and subtly shifting discord anticipates the industrial techno of Regis and Surgeon. Sherwood’s work with groups such as this usually retains a subtle funk pulse, his rhythmic sensibility honed through working with Jamaican producers such as Prince Far I, and it’s still present here, albeit more buried than usual.

Adrian’s work rate during the 80s was truly extraordinary, with many projects over-lapping and sharing members, studio session time, or even entire backing tracks! His initial collaborations with Keith, Doug and Skip (formerly the Sugarhill Gang) are no exception, producing electro 12”s under the name Fats Comet, production work on the breakthrough album by Ministry, solo records by Keith LeBlanc and Doug Wimbish, and of course the opening salvos from the extraordinary Tackhead. Their mixture of cut-up political dialogue, DMX breakbeats, and live instrumentation was completely new at the time, and became hugely influential. Most impressively of all, they could translate their studio experimentation to the concert stage with devastating effect.

Former singer of the underrated Modern Eon, the mysterious Ché cut one album for Siren Records before disappearing completely. Utilising a Tackhead backing track, this is somewhere between the dark sleaze pop of Soft Cell and later groups such as Nine Inch Nails (who we’ll get to in a bit). This definitely would have made the cut for Sherwood At The Controls Volume 2, but like a lot of the tracks picked here that were recorded for labels other than On-U, the rights are sadly lost in major label legal limbo. If anyone know the whereabouts of A.J. Johnson then please let us know!

A lot of the industrial stuff that Adrian worked on was for US and European groups like KMFDM, Nitzer Ebb, and Pankow, but he finally got to work with pioneers of the UK sound in 87, albeit in their more commercial phase on the Code album. This version actually sees the work of two seminal producers coming together as it’s a Francois Kevorkian remix of an Adrian Sherwood production. At early acid house parties there wasn’t enough actual dance tracks being made, so it wouldn’t be unusual to hear stuff like this or New Order mixed in with the latest imports from Chicago and Detroit.

Speaking of embryonic dance music, the looped hip-hop break, disco string stabs, and dubbed out vocals of this 1990 track would sit easily in a balearic record box, though the underlying menace in the ex-Pop Group frontman’s voice separate it from any second-summer-of-love vibes. Included on Mark’s excellent Metatron album as well as the third volume in On-U’s much-loved Pay It All Back series of label samplers.

Vancouver’s Skinny Puppy were one of the most popular bands on the North American industrial scene, music that only had a distant relationship to the tape experiments of late-70s UK artists such as Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire and Nurse With Wound. Far more rooted in new wave and goth, these later bands utilised synthesizers, samplers and drum machines but with more of a structured, rockist take on industrial themes. These sounds were at least primed for the dancefloor, something that couldn’t be said for say, the early works of Whitehouse. This sub-genre (which also pollinated in Europe with the likes of Front 242 and Laibach) has been dubbed ‘Metal Dance’ by the aforementioned Trevor Jackson, and is well-covered on his two compilation volumes of the same name on the Strut label.

Trent Reznor was a self-confessed fan of the work Sherwood had done with other industrial groups (particularly Ministry) and tracked him down to work on his debut album as NiN, Pretty Hate Machine. Co-produced by Adrian and Tackhead’s Keith LeBlanc, “Down In It” was the debut Nine Inch Nails single and the first music that most people heard from the new artist, and has clear antecedents in the previous tracks featured in this playlist, with the notable difference that the album went on to sell several million copies! Adrian has remixed other Nine Inch Nails tracks and it’s well worth hearing his overhauls of “Sin” and “Starfuckers Inc.”.