Continuing my top 50 albums of all time.
“Perhaps we better start from the beginning.”
I guess that’s some great advice, let’s start from the beginning.
In the beginning there was Industrial music and in the 90’s, when metal as I loved it, died off, I tried to pivot to Industrial. This didn’t go well. I discovered that Ministry had only one good album. I delved into the Wax Trax back catalogue and did not care for it. I listened to albums on Invisible Records and did not enjoy them. I even subjected myself to Pigface albums and I discovered that almost the entire genre bored me to tears.
Then along came White Zombie and it’s safe to say that Astro-Creep, or Astro-Creep: 2000 – Songs of Love, Destruction and Other Synthetic Delusions of the Electric Head to give the album, it’s full, utterly stupid title, is anything but boring.
Even if you hated this album with every fibre of your being, boring is not a word you’re going to use. This album is so over the top that it just puts a silly grin on my face, start to finish and may result in spontaneous air drumming / guitar if I’m not paying enough attention to my surroundings.
Astro-Creep might also not be industrial at all, it could just be groove metal with electronics, but I really couldn’t give a fuck, I’m having too much fun. And to be honest there is very little music I listen to that can be called fun.
This album is just a carnival ride of big riffs, an obsession with trashy horror films and a strange kind of cool, all stitched together into some sort of a Frankenalbum with weird film samples. This album just shouldn’t work. Oh my Brethren, this album works.
Well. It works for me.
Electro Head, Part 1 sets the band’s intentions out pretty quickly, huge drums, filthy riffs and Rob’s whiskey and gravel vocals. Sure it’s heavy but it’s strangely catchy as well.
To be honest, most of this album is so OTT and daft that you could play it on a jug at a hoedown and everyone would still lose their minds.
I’ve heard More Human Than Human more times than I can possibly count, but I still get those same goosebumps as I did on the first listen. Every time I hear that electronic opening line I have the urge to run for the dance floor and to jump around like a very crazy person.
The last track, Blood, Milk, Sky is my favourite on the album. WZ slow everything down and go sludgy with a middle eastern themed riff. That combined with an Eastern styled, wordless female vocal makes this song stand out completely from the rest of the album. It’s just got this irresistible slow groove that I’m a sucker for and Rob’s low, muttered, gravely voice gives the whole thing such weight. The song is an odd choice for the band, but it winds down a frantic album and gently eases the listener out of the madness that’s gone before it.
The thing that dates this album the most is the use of film samples in almost every song. I have no idea how they got the clearance for these, but seeing as it was the 90’s they probably didn’t bother. While there’s nothing original about film samples in industrial, WZ just makes it seem effortless. I’m not sure how an album built on so many samples stays fresh, but the use of B movie and horror dialogue are as important as the riffs on here.
This album has sold 2,600,000 copies in America since its release. That’s insane. This is an album that should have become a cult album and gone unnoticed by the wider world. I’m not one for rose tinted glasses but I’m pretty sure nothing like this could break out like that today.
Nothing Rob Zombie has done before or after has come close to this for me, this is just a one and done for me and I’m perfectly happy with that. This album is lightning in a bottle and it’s all I need from this band..
* I should add before the Rivithead crowd tries to stomp me, there are several other industrial albums on this list. Please stop scowling at me.
The ways of exile 
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