GOTHSTAM

Attrition Profile: Formed in 1980 by Martin Bowes in Coventry, England, Attrition’s early output presaged trends that would emerge as genres of their own in the ’90s gothic/industrial resurgence. Drones and tape manipulations released under the title 'Death House' prefigured dark ambient “isolationism” by almost 10 years, while the group’s first two proper albums — 'The Attrition of Reason' and 'Smiling at the Hypogonder Club' — set the tone for the style now known as darkwave. Attrition had its day in the US college-radio spotlight with the spooky “Monkey in a Bin,” released alongside the likes of Nina Hagen, Alan Jourgensen, The Smiths, Siouxsie and Howard Jones on the 1987 Wax Trax compilation Animal Liberation (which benefited PETA). Since then, Attrition has released more than twenty albums, each one striking a balance between dualistic forces: Gloomy atmospheres mixed with prodding beats; classical bombast melded with ambient noise; Bowe...