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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.

Miseryplay in the dock

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Greymachine is an experimental industrial noise project formed in 2006, built around Godflesh and Jesu frontman Justin Broadrick and Isis frontman Aaron Turner, with bassists Dave Cochrane (Head of David) and Diarmuid Dalton (Jesu). Broadrick described it as needing "something black to Jesu's white," pairing crushing beats, dissonant guitar, and harsh electronics. Their debut album Disconnected was produced by Broadrick and released on 4 August 2009 via Turner's label Hydra Head Records.

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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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.

Corrections House is an American industrial-sludge supergroup formed in 2012, bringing together Scott Kelly of Neurosis, Mike IX Williams of Eyehategod, Sanford Parker, and Bruce Lamont of Yakuza. The group methodically creates and destroys through dark, apocalyptic soundscapes built from riffs, saxophone, electronic loops, and Williams' corroded vocals. They released their debut album Last City Zero (2013) and its follow-up Know How to Carry a Whip (2015) on Neurot Recordings.

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.

House of Hayduk is the solo/collective vehicle of Düreforsög guitarist Mads Heldtberg. Its 2012 debut City of Quartz (Koolarrow Records) is an instrumental record built from analogue synthesizers, dub-inflected bass and free-form percussion, evoking a Blade Runner-style dystopia (the title nods to Mike Davis's book on Los Angeles). Faith No More bassist Billy Gould performs on the record, alongside This Heat's Charles Hayward.

Hijokaidan are a foundational Japanese noise/free-improvisation group formed in 1979, the project of guitarist Jojo Hiroshige, who also runs Osaka's legendary Alchemy Records. With a lineup that has swelled from two to fourteen members, they pioneered Japanoise as an anti-music of chaotic feedback and notoriously destructive live performances. Regulars include Hiroshige's wife Junko and electronics player Toshiji Mikawa.

Black Mayonnaise is the long-running one-man bedroom project of Mike Duncan from Akron, Ohio, active since August 1991. It blends heavily detuned, distorted doom/sludge guitar with drum-machine programming, tape loops and cut-up sonic manipulation into a lo-fi, ambient/psych-drone-inflected sound. Cited influences include old Godflesh, old Carcass, Butthole Surfers and Big Black; notable releases include TTSSATTSR (2004) and the retrospective compilation When You Get Caught Between the Moon and Boston Harbor (2011). (Verified spelling: the RYM scout note had a typo, 'Black Mayonaise' — the real band spells it 'Black Mayonnaise'.)

House of Low Culture is an American drone/dark ambient and experimental project fronted by Aaron Turner (Isis, Sumac), active since 2000 and named after a song from Isis's Sawblade EP. Its music marries warm cinematic tones with murky, sub-nautical textures, and its lineup has drawn on figures from the wider Hydra Head/experimental-metal orbit. Since 2010 the project has centered on Turner alongside his Mamiffer bandmate and wife Faith Coloccia, with Kevin Micka joining in 2020.