Genre/Influences: Experimental, Abstract, Industrial.

Format: Digital, CD.

Background/Info: De Fabriek is a Dutsh project which needs no further introduction for lovers of Experimental/Industrial music. So they may remember the album “Music For Hippies” released together with P.Funk in 1988. The original recording has been recovered from dust and released by EE Tapes.

Content: This album takes us back to the original and creative spirit of the 80s. The work reflects the early ‘anarchistic’ way of composing; an impressive canvas of sounds and noises featuring field recordings which have been sticked together. You’ll notice guitar play creating a psychedelic effect while another passage sounds more into a kind of Industrial-Funk. Vocals have been manipulated as an extra sound effect.

+ + + : This is the kind of work reminding us the early Industrial/Experimental years. No compromises nor standards, but just creating music right from the heart and the soul. This music feels intuitive and improvised, but the result is worthy of examination. I like the album’s diversity which however has to be seen as an entity.

– – – : It will probably remain too abstract for listeners, but this how early Industrial/Experimental sounded-like.

Conclusion: This work is an essential document in the history of early Industrial/Experimental music; maybe not the most renowned and famous work, but a great piece of music.

Best songs: “4”, “3”, “10”.

Rate: 8.

Artist: www.facebook.com/defabriekthefactory

Label: www.eetapes.be / www.facebook.com/eriek.vanhavere

EE Tapes released De Fabriek & P.Funk “Music For Hippies (Remix)” on 1 February 2022. The Belgian edition is a CD limited to 75 copies, packaged in an A5-sized card cover inside a transparent ziplock bag, and the eleven pieces are untitled and numbered from “track 1” to “track 11”. The recording is also available digitally through the label.

Listen to “Music For Hippies (Remix)”:

About De Fabriek

De Fabriek, Dutch for The Factory, formed in Zwolle in the Netherlands at the end of the 1970s around Richard van Dellen and Andries D. Eker. The group operates as a collective and a label rather than a fixed band, and has recorded with acts including Solenoid, O.R.D.U.C., Brume, Vivenza, The Klinik and Gen Ken Montgomery.

“Music For Hippies” first appeared as a cassette album on the group’s own label in 1988, credited to De Fabriek and P.Funk. De Fabriek reissued the material on a numbered, limited CD in 2021, and EE Tapes followed with this Belgian remix edition in February 2022.

Platform 23 Records later issued a remastered 12-inch version of “Music For Hippies” in 2023.

Inferno Sound Diaries

I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.

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