- Punk Rock, Post-Punk, Experimental & Avant-Garde Music
- Proto Punk, some bands influenced by Kraut Rock, Industrial and/or Heavy Metal
Noise Rock (alternately known as "noise punk" or just "noise") is Exactly What It Says on the Tin: a genre of rock with a focus on abrasive noise. Noise rockers for the most part have a pronounced fondness for creating ear-bleeding music with the standard rock instrumentation; how important other factors are, such as melody or lyrics, varies from band to band. (Compare, for example, Sonic Youth to Lightning Bolt, Boredoms to The Pop Group. The differences in the songwriting department are far more striking than the similarities.) Noise rockers are known for their confrontational performances, unsurprisingly enough.
Noise rock's antecedents can be traced to proto-punk bands like The Velvet Underground and The Stooges, the No Wave scene, and Hardcore Punk. (And that's not even counting all of the bizarre Japanese groups dating back to The '60s like Les Rallizes Dénudés, or the quirked-out pre-Sex Pistols aberrations like Half-Japanese, which while obscure have made a huge impact on the genre.) The genre as a unified movement emerged in The '80s and has bubbled underground ever since, with the occasional moment where some band gets really popular. Noise rock was also an influence on Shoegazing, Grindcore, Industrial Metal, Drone Doom, Grunge, and a few varieties of Hardcore Punk and Metalcore. It also very commonly overlaps with Post-Hardcore, and most noise rock acts comfortably fit within that genre as well.
Not to be confused with Noise Pop, which is something slightly different.
Bands commonly associated with Noise Rock include:
- Acid Mothers Temple (Primarily a Psychedelic/Space Rock band, but Noise Rock has always been an influence on their work).
- Arab On Radar
- Aids Wolf
- Band Of Susans — Had a strong Post-Rock streak.
- Barkmarket
- Gimmick
- Black Flag — Hardcore punk meets noise rock, prog rock, avant-garde jazz, and early '70s heavy metal.
- black midi - Mixed with math rock, prog rock, no wave, and probably a dozen other genres.
- Boredoms — Earlier albums only; later work is more Psychedelic Rock.
- Boris — Along with Doom Metal, Stoner Rock, Post-Rock, Drone, and whatever else they feel like.
- Butthole Surfers — Noise rock's traveling freak show.
- Child Bite
- Chrome — Acid Punk grandfathers of Industrial Metal. At their noisiest and harshest from 1978-1979.
- Comparative Anatomy — Two bassists and a drum machine who dress up in animal costumes and delve into noisegrind.
- Cop Shoot Cop — (Also Industrial)
- Couch Slut
- Daughters - Noise rock with prominent elements of no wave, Post-Punk, and industrial. Their first album is mathcore instead.
- 2018 - You Won't Get What You Want
- Death from Above 1979 (combined with Dance-Punk)
- Dinosaur Jr. — Perhaps the most accessible of the bunch, bordering on Grunge. Still, songs like "Don't" really can't be classified as anything but noise rock.
- Drive Like Jehu (also emo)
- Drunkdriver
- Einstürzende Neubauten — Early in their career, pioneered Industrial.
- Flipper — Famous for the batshit insane epic "Sex Bomb", as well as its enormous influence on sludge metal and (especially) grunge.
- Foetus — and its many incarnations. Also Industrial.
- Fushitsusha
- Gilla Band
- Glenn Branca — Mixes this with Modern Classical and Avant-Garde Music
- 1981 - The Ascension
- Godflesh — See also Industrial Metal.
- Guitar Wolf
- Hanatarash
- Happy Flowers
- HAWKS
- HEALTH — One of the more accessible noise rock groups, would later on mix their usual noise rock fare with EBM on Death Magic and Industrial Metal on Slaves of Fear.
- Hella — A hybrid of noise rock and math rock.
- Helmet — Formed by ex-Band of Susans member Page Hamilton. Also counts as Alternative Metal and Post-Hardcore.
- Hole — Pretty on the Inside, also some elements of this on Live Through This.
- Jawbox
- The Jesus Lizard
- John Lennon and Yoko Ono — Their first two albums together are early examples of noise rock.
- KEN mode — A hybrid of noise rock, metalcore, sludge metal, post-rock, and emo, briefly changed to retro-styled post-hardcore/proto-grunge on Success before returning to their established style on Loved.
- Kittens — Along with influences from Country Music and Hardcore Punk.
- Liars — At first, before they went dance-punk, and then went almost everywhere else.
- Lightning Bolt
- Live Skull — A member of the same NYC scene which gave the world Swans and Sonic Youth, among others.
- Melt-Banana — A female-fronted example, with extreme Genre-Busting tendencies.
- Mer Shopping Missbruk for Studenter — A mix of Noise Rock, Harsh Noise, Industrial, and Ambient.
- Mclusky
- Nirvana - Mixed with their usual Grunge sound on In Utero, and the occasional track outside of it.
- No Age
- Yoko Ono
- The Paper Chase
- Pink And Brown
- A Place To Bury Strangers
- The Pop Group — See also Post-Punk, Genre-Busting.
- The Psychic Paramount — Loud, abrasive noise rock mixed with Psychedelic Rock.
- Pussy Galore
- Queenadreena
- Les Rallizes Dénudés
- Ramleh — Combined Hard Rock with Industrial Power Electronics.
- Lou Reed
- Metal Machine Music (1975)
- The Residents
- 1976 - The Third Reich 'n Roll
- 1979 - Eskimo
- 1980 - The Commercial Album
- Royal Trux — Though they had bluesy tendencies as well.
- Satanized
- Les Savy Fav
- Scarling — A four-way crash between Noise Rock, Noise Pop, Shoegazing and Goth Rock.
- Scratch Acid
- Skull Kontrol
- Sonic Youth — Especially 1981-1985.
- Spacemen 3
- Steel Pole Bathtub
- Steve Albini, recording engineer, played guitar and/or sang in the following Noise Rock bands:
- Street Sects — Also Industrial, plunderphonics and Harsh Noise.
- Swans — Mainly 1982-1986, with later works predicating Post-Rock.
- 2012 - The Seer
- 2014 - To Be Kind
- Tad (also grunge)
- Today Is The Day — also Grindcore and Avant-Garde Metal.
- Totimoshi
- Unsane — A particularly aggressive group that also counts as Post-Hardcore.
- Unwound — A fusion of this and Post-Hardcore, they have been hugely influential in both scenes.
- The Velvet Underground — The final tracks of the first two albums, namely "European Son" on the first and "Sister Ray" on the latter are seen as the earliest examples of the genre.
- The Velvet Underground & Nico (1967)
- White Light/White Heat (1968)
- Whores. (some sludge metal and grunge elements on Gold)
- Zeni Geva — A Japanese group with Metal and Progressive Rock influences.
- John Zorn
- Radio (1993)
