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Industrial music is a loose term for a number of different styles of electronic and experimental music. First used in the mid 1970s to describe the then-unique sound of Industrial Records artists, a wide variety of artists and labels have since come to be called "Industrial". This definition may include Avant-garde performance artists such as Throbbing Gristle, Einstürzende Neubauten and Laibach; noise projects like Merzbow or Whitehouse; electronic body music/elektro acts such as Front 242, Skinny Puppy, KMFDM and Nitzer Ebb; electronic rock acts like Nine Inch Nails or Ministry; or writers J.G. Ballard and William S. Burroughs.
The term was meant by its creators to evoke the idea of music created for a new generation of people, previous music being more agricultural. Specifically, it referred to the streamlined process by which the music was being made, although many people later interpreted the word as a poetic reference to an "industrial" aesthetic, recalling factories and inhuman machinery. On this topic, Peter Christopherson of Industrial Records once remarked, "the original idea of Industrial Records was to reject what the growing industry was telling you at the time what music was supposed to be." 
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