Hijokaidan

Incapacitants are a foundational Japanese noise duo formed in Osaka in 1981 by Toshiji Mikawa as a solo offshoot from Hijokaidan. After relocating to Tokyo, Mikawa was joined by Fumio Kosakai (also of C.C.C.C.) to form the enduring duo, whose stated aim is 'pure' noise free of musical intention or human idea, built from feedback, vocals and electronics. Alongside Merzbow and Hijokaidan, they are pillars of the 1980s Japanoise movement.

Merzbow is the project of Japanese musician Masami Akita, the most prolific and definitive figure in harsh noise, working in distortion, feedback, synthesizers and homemade noisemakers since the late 1970s. His vast collaborative discography connects him deep into this atlas: he has recorded with Boris continuously since 1997 (Megatone, Gensho, 2R0I2P0), mixed the tracks "O)))Bow 1/2" on Sunn O)))'s Flight of the Behemoth (2002), and later performed live with Sunn O))) at Tokyo's Earthdom in 2007. His early-career work also included collaborations with KK Null.

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Doolhof (Dutch for 'maze') is an experimental collaboration between Aaron Turner (Sumac, Old Man Gloom, ex-Isis) on guitars and effects, Will Brooks a.k.a. MC dälek of dälek on vocals and electronics, and Belgian audio-visual artist Dennis Tyfus on vocals, tapes and effects. Recorded live at Roadburn Festival 2019 in Tilburg and released by Turner's SIGE Records in 2020, it fuses abstract hip-hop, drone, ambient and noise into immersive, texture-focused long-form pieces.

Live At Roadburn Festival, April 13th 2019 (Excerpt)play in the dock

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Excepter are a Brooklyn experimental/noise group founded in 2002 by John Fell Ryan (ex-No-Neck Blues Band), released on Load Records and Animal Collective's Paw Tracks — often grouped with Animal Collective and Black Dice as part of a mid-2000s New York noise/psych "class of 2003." Their 2013 record Christisland was recorded in Copenhagen with an expanded, Escho-scene lineup that included Düreforsög's Nis Bysted and KLoAK's Niels Kristian Eriksen.

Zonal are the British duo of Justin Broadrick (Godflesh) and Kevin Martin (The Bug), a reactivation of their 1990s Techno Animal partnership trading in cavernous bass, cacophonous dub and ear-splitting drone. Their debut album Wrecked was released on Relapse Records on 25 October 2019, with Philadelphia poet-vocalist Moor Mother featured across its first six tracks. The record was mastered by Stefan Betke (Pole) and pairs industrial hip-hop menace with drone-metal weight.

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Jazkamer (also spelled Jazzkammer) was the Bergen, Norway noise/drone duo of John Hegre and Lasse Marhaug, active 1998–2012 across 25 albums of tape manipulation, field recording, and concrete-music noise. Their 2006 concept album Metal Music Machine (and a 2010 sequel) reimagined Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music, drafting Enslaved's Ivar Bjørnson and Iver Sandøy into the sessions.

Author & Punisher is the one-man industrial/drone/doom-metal project of San Diego mechanical engineer Tristan Shone, who performs on custom-designed and hand-fabricated instruments he calls 'Drone Machines' and 'Dub Machines'. Handpicked by Tool to support their 2020 tour, Shone returned the favor on his 2022 Relapse album Krüller: Tool's Danny Carey drums on 'Misery' and bassist Justin Chancellor plays on 'Centurion'. The result pairs monolithic, machine-driven weight with dub space and industrial menace.

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Bastard Noise is an American noise/powerviolence project founded in 1991 in Los Angeles by Eric Wood, Henry Barnes, and W.T. Nelson as a sister project to Man Is the Bastard; Wood has been its sole constant member since Man Is the Bastard's 1997 breakup. The project builds harsh-noise walls of feedback, crackling electronics, and low synth drones under guttural vocals, with Wood collaborating live and on record with artists including Merzbow and Keiji Haino. The band favors physical releases over streaming/digital distribution.

North Carolina solo producer (Roxanne Jonas Radclyffe) whose December 2024 album VIRLGOID pairs maximalist, self-mixed/mastered production with metal riffing and a fragmented trans-vigilante narrative concept; RateYourMusic tags the record Avant-Garde Metal/Post-Metal, and her own Bandcamp genre tags span deathstep, drone metal, industrial metal, nu metal and "metamodernism." One of dozens of aliased projects in a prolific, DIY internet-native discography.

Griiim is the solo project of Paris-based visual artist and musician Maxime 'MT' Taccardi (also the sole member of atlas act K.F.R.), fusing atmospheric black metal with trap, trip-hop, industrial noise, and power electronics. Angry Metal Guy describes 2019 debut Pope Art as 'an eerie concoction of trap, trip-hop, industrial, noise and black metal' where 'true-blue riffs surface only once' and guitars mostly function to 'simulate droning dives and oppressive noise' under 'phat beats.' RateYourMusic and Discogs tag the record Avant-Garde Metal / Atmospheric Black Metal, and it features guest vocalists Meyhna'ch (Mutiilation) and O (Obskuritatem), released via Purity Through Fire.