Noise music is a genre of music that is characterised by the expressive use ofnoise. This type of music tends to challenge the distinction that is made in conventional musical practices between musical and non-musical sound.^[4] Noise music includes a wide range ofmusical styles andsound-based creative practices that feature noise as a primaryaspect.

Noise music can feature acoustically or electronically generated noise, and both traditional and unconventional musical instruments. It may incorporate live machine sounds, non-musicalvocal techniques, physically manipulated audio media,processed sound recordings,field recording,computer-generated noise,stochastic process, and other randomly produced electronic signals such asdistortion,feedback,static, hiss and hum. There may also be emphasis on high volume levels and lengthy, continuous pieces. More generally noise music may contain aspects such asimprovisation,extended technique,cacophony andindeterminacy. In many instances, conventional use of melody, harmony, rhythm or pulse is dispensed with.^[5][6][7][8]

TheFuturist art movement (with most notablyLuigi Russolo'sIntonarumori andL'Arte dei Rumori (The Art of Noises) manifesto) was important for the development of the noise aesthetic, as was theDada art movement (a prime example being theAntisymphony concert performed on April 30, 1919, in Berlin).^[9][10] In the 1920s, the French composerEdgard Varèse, whenNew York Dada associated viaMarcel Duchamp andFrancis Picabia's magazine391, conceived of the elements of his music in terms ofsound-masses; writing in the first half of the 1920s,Offrandes,Hyperprism,Octandre, andIntégrales.^[11][12] Varèse thought that "to stubbornly conditioned ears, anything new in music has always been callednoise", and he posed the question: "what is music but organized noises?"^[13]

Pierre Schaeffer'smusique concrète 1948 compositionsCinq études de bruits (Five Noise Studies), that began withEtude aux Chemins de Fer (Railway Study) are key to this history.^[14]Etude aux Chemins de Fer consisted of a set of recordings made at the train station Gare des Batignolles in Paris that included six steam locomotives whistling and trains accelerating and moving over the tracks. The piece was derived entirely from recorded noise sounds that were not musical, thus a realization of Russolo's conviction that noise could be an acceptable source of music.Cinq études de bruits premiered via a radio broadcast on October 5, 1948, calledConcert de bruits (Noise Concert).^[14]

Later in the 1960s, theFluxus art movement played an important role, specifically the Fluxus artistsJoe Jones,Yasunao Tone,George Brecht,Robert Watts,Wolf Vostell,Dieter Roth,Yoko Ono,Nam June Paik,Walter De Maria'sOcean Music,Milan Knížák'sBroken Music Composition, earlyLa Monte Young,Takehisa Kosugi,^[15] and theAnalog #1 (Noise Study) (1961) by Fluxus-related composerJames Tenney.^[16][17]

Contemporary noise music is often associated with extreme volume and distortion.^[18] Notable genres that exploit such techniques includenoise rock andno wave,industrial music,Japanoise, andpostdigital music such asglitch.^[19][20] In the domain ofexperimental rock, examples includeLou Reed'sMetal Machine Music andSonic Youth.^[21] Other notable examples of composers and bands that feature noise based materials include works byIannis Xenakis,Karlheinz Stockhausen,Helmut Lachenmann,Cornelius Cardew,Theatre of Eternal Music,Glenn Branca,Rhys Chatham,Ryoji Ikeda,Survival Research Laboratories,Whitehouse,Coil,Merzbow,Cabaret Voltaire,Psychic TV,Jean Tinguely's recordings of hissound sculpture (specificallyBascule VII), the music ofHermann Nitsch'sOrgien Mysterien Theater, andLa Monte Young's bowed gong works from the late 1960s.^[22]

According to Danish noise and music theorist Torben Sangild, one single definition of noise in music is not possible. Sangild instead provides three basic definitions of noise: amusical acoustics definition, a second communicative definition based ondistortion or disturbance of a communicative signal, and a third definition based insubjectivity (what is noise to one person can be meaningful to another; what was considered unpleasant sound yesterday is not today).^[23]

According toMurray Schafer there are four types of noise: unwanted noise, unmusical sound, any loud sound, and a disturbance in any signaling system (such as static on a telephone).^[24] Definitions regarding what is considered noise, relative to music, have changed over time.^[25]Ben Watson, in his articleNoise as Permanent Revolution, points out thatLudwig van Beethoven'sGrosse Fuge (1825) "sounded like noise" to his audience at the time. Indeed, Beethoven's publishers persuaded him to remove it from its original setting as the last movement of a string quartet. He did so, replacing it with a sparklingAllegro. They subsequently published it separately.^[26]

In attempting to define noise music and its value, Paul Hegarty (2007) cites the work of noted cultural criticsJean Baudrillard,Georges Bataille andTheodor Adorno and through their work traces the history of "noise". He defines noise at different times as "intrusive, unwanted", "lacking skill, not being appropriate" and "a threatening emptiness". He traces these trends starting with 18th-century concert hall music. Hegarty contends that it isJohn Cage's composition4'33", in which an audience sits through four and a half minutes of "silence" (Cage 1973), that represents the beginning of noise music proper. For Hegarty, "noise music", as with4'33", is that music made up of incidental sounds that represent perfectly the tension between "desirable" sound (properly played musical notes) and undesirable "noise" that make up all noise music fromErik Satie toNON toGlenn Branca. Writing aboutJapanese noise music, Hegarty suggests that "it is not a genre, but it is also a genre that is multiple, and characterized by this very multiplicity ... Japanese noise music can come in all styles, referring to all other genres ... but crucially asks the question of genre—what does it mean to be categorized, categorizable, definable?" (Hegarty 2007:133).

WriterDouglas Kahn, in his workNoise, Water, Meat: A History of Sound in the Arts (1999), discusses the use of noise as a medium and explores the ideas ofAntonin Artaud,George Brecht,William Burroughs,Sergei Eisenstein,Fluxus,Allan Kaprow,Michael McClure,Yoko Ono,Jackson Pollock,Luigi Russolo, andDziga Vertov.

InNoise: The Political Economy of Music (1985),Jacques Attali explores the relationship between noise music and the future of society by considering noise music as not merely reflective of, but importantly pre-figurative of social transformations. He indicates that noise in music is a predictor of social change and demonstrates how noise acts as thesubconscious of society—validating and testing new social and political realities.^[27] His alternative view of the standard history of music, with his emphasis on noise, theorized culture in a way that influenced many noise music theoretical studies to follow, such asBrandon LaBelle'sBackground Noise: Perspectives on Sound Art (2006),Alan Licht'sSound Art: Beyond Music, between Categories (2007), Thomas Bey William Bailey'sMicro Bionic: Radical Electronic Music and Sound Art in the 21st Century (2009),Caleb Kelly'sCracked Media: The Sound of Malfunction (2009),Joseph Nechvatal'sImmersion Into Noise (2011), and Mark Delaere'sNoise as a Constructive Element in Music Theoretical and Music-Analytical Perspectives (2022).

Like much of modern and contemporary art, noise music takes characteristics of the perceived negative traits of noise mentioned below and uses them inaesthetic and imaginative ways.^[28]

In common use, the wordnoise means unwanted sound ornoise pollution.^[29]In electronics noise can refer to the electronic signal corresponding to acoustic noise (in an audio system) or the electronic signal corresponding to the (visual) noise commonly seen as 'snow' on a degraded television or video image.^[30] In signal processing or computing it can be considered data without meaning; that is, data that is not being used to transmit a signal, but is simply produced as an unwanted by-product of other activities. Noise can block, distort, or change the meaning of a message in both human and electronic communication.White noise is a randomsignal (or process) with a flatpower spectral density.^[31] In other words, the signal contains equal power within a fixedbandwidth at any center frequency. White noise is considered analogous towhite light which contains all frequencies.^[32][33]

In much the same way the earlymodernists were inspired bynaïve art, some contemporarydigital art noise musicians are excited by the archaic audio technologies such as wire-recorders, the8-track cartridge, andvinyl records.^[34] Many artists not only build their own noise-generating devices, but even their own specialized recording equipment and customsoftware (for example, theC++ software used in creating theviral symphOny byJoseph Nechvatal).^[35][36]

In "Futurism and Musical Notes", Daniele Lombardi discussed the French composer Carol-Bérard; a pupil ofIsaac Albéniz, who composed aSymphony of Mechanical Forces in 1910, wrote on the problems of the instrumentation of noise music, and developed a notation system.^[37]

In 1913Futurist artistLuigi Russolo wrote his manifesto,L'Arte dei Rumori, translated asThe Art of Noises,^[38] stating that the industrial revolution had given modern men a greater capacity to appreciate more complex sounds. Russolo found traditional melodic music confining and envisioned noise music as its future replacement. He designed and constructed a number of noise-generating devices calledintonarumori and assembled a noiseorchestra to perform with them. Works entitledRisveglio di una città (Awakening of a City) andConvegno d'aeroplani e d'automobili (The Meeting of Aeroplanes and Automobiles) were both performed for the first time in 1914.^[39]

A performance of hisGran Concerto Futuristico (1917) was met with strong disapproval and violence from the audience, as Russolo himself had predicted. None of his intoning devices have survived, though recently some have been reconstructed and used in performances. Although Russolo's works bear little resemblance to contemporary noise music such asJapanoise, his efforts helped to introduce noise as a musicalaesthetic and broaden the perception of sound as an artistic medium.^[40][41]

At first the art of music sought purity, limpidity and sweetness of sound. Then different sounds were amalgamated, care being taken, however, to caress the ear with gentle harmonies. Today music, as it becomes continually more complicated, strives to amalgamate the most dissonant, strange and harsh sounds. In this way we come ever closer tonoise-sound.

— Luigi RussoloThe Art of Noises (1913)^[42]

Antonio Russolo, Luigi's brother and fellow ItalianFuturist composer, produced a recording of two works featuring the originalintonarumori. The 1921 madephonograph with works entitledCorale andSerenata, combined conventional orchestral music set against the famous noise machines and is the only surviving sound recording.^[43]

An earlyDada-related work from 1916 byMarcel Duchamp also worked with noise, but in an almost silent way. One of thefound objectReadymades of Marcel Duchamp,A Bruit Secret (With Hidden Noise), was a collaborative work that created a noise instrument that Duchamp accomplished withWalter Arensberg.^[44] What rattles inside whenA Bruit Secret is shaken remains a mystery.^[45]

In the same period the utilisation offound sound as a musical resource was starting to be explored. An early example isParade, a performance produced at the Chatelet Theatre, Paris, on May 18, 1917, that was conceived byJean Cocteau, with design byPablo Picasso, choreography byLeonid Massine, and music byEric Satie. The extra-musical materials used in the production were referred to astrompe l'oreille sounds by Cocteau and included adynamo,Morse code machine, sirens, steam engine, airplane motor, and typewriters.^[46]Arseny Avraamov's compositionSymphony of Factory Sirens involved navy ship sirens and whistles, bus and car horns, factory sirens, cannons, foghorns, artillery guns, machine guns, hydro-airplanes, a specially designed steam-whistle machine creating noisy renderings ofInternationale andMarseillaise for a piece conducted by a team using flags and pistols when performed in the city ofBaku in 1922.^[47] In 1923,Arthur Honegger createdPacific 231, amodernist musical composition that imitates the sound of a steam locomotive.^[48] Another example isOttorino Respighi's 1924 orchestral piecePines of Rome, which included thephonographic playback of a nightingale recording.^[46] Also in 1924,George Antheil created a work titledBallet Mécanique with instrumentation that included 16pianos, 3airplane propellers, and 7electric bells. The work was originally conceived as music for theDada film of the same name, byDudley Murphy andFernand Léger, but in 1926 it premiered independently as a concert piece.^[49][50]

In 1930Paul Hindemith andErnst Toch recycled records to create sound montages and in 1936Edgard Varèse experimented with records, playing them backwards, and at varying speeds.^[51] Varese had earlier used sirens to create what he called a "continuous flowing curve" of sound that he could not achieve with acoustic instruments. In 1931, Varese'sIonisation for 13 players featured 2 sirens, alion's roar, and used 37 percussion instruments to create a repertoire of unpitched sounds making it the first musical work to be organized solely on the basis of noise.^[52][53] In remarking on Varese's contributions the American composerJohn Cage stated that Varese had "established the present nature of music" and that he had "moved into the field of sound itself while others were still discriminating 'musical tones' from noises".^[54]

In an essay written in 1937, Cage expressed an interest in using extra-musical materials^[55] and came to distinguish between found sounds, which he called noise, and musical sounds, examples of which included: rain, static between radio channels, and "a truck at fifty miles per hour". Essentially, Cage made no distinction, in his view all sounds have the potential to be used creatively. His aim was to capture and control elements of the sonic environment and employ a method of sound organisation, a term borrowed from Varese, to bring meaning to the sound materials.^[56] Cage began in 1939 to create a series of works that explored his stated aims, the first beingImaginary Landscape #1 for instruments including two variable speed turntables with frequency recordings.^[57]

In 1961,James Tenney composedAnalogue #1: Noise Study (for tape) using computer synthesized noise andCollage No.1 (Blue Suede) (for tape) by sampling and manipulating a famousElvis Presley recording.^[58]

I believe that the use of noise to make music will continue and increase until we reach a music produced through the aid of electrical instruments which will make available for musical purposes any and all sounds that can be heard.

— John CageThe Future of Music: Credo (1937)

In 1932,Bauhaus artistsLászló Moholy-Nagy,Oskar Fischinger andPaul Arma experimented with modifying the physical contents of record grooves.^[58]

Under the influence ofHenry Cowell in San Francisco in the late 1940s,^[59]Lou Harrison andJohn Cage began composing music forjunk (waste) percussion ensembles, scouring junkyards and Chinatown antique shops for appropriately tuned brake drums, flower pots, gongs, and more.

In Europe, during the late 1940s,Pierre Schaeffer coined the termmusique concrète to refer to the peculiar nature of sounds on tape, separated from the source that generated them initially.^[60] Pierre Schaeffer helped formStudio d'Essai of theRadiodiffusion-Télévision Française in Paris during World War II. Initially serving theFrench Resistance, Studio d'Essai became a hub for musical development centered around implementing electronic devices in compositions. It was from this group that musique concrète was developed. A type ofelectroacoustic music, musique concrète is characterized by its use of recorded sound, electronics, tape, animate and inanimate sound sources, and various manipulation techniques. The first of Schaeffer'sCinq études de bruits (Five Noise Etudes), calledÉtude aux chemins de fer (1948) consisted of transformed locomotive sounds.^[14] The last étude,Étude pathétique (1948), makes use of sounds recorded from sauce pans and canal boats.Cinq études de bruits was premiered via a radio broadcast on October 5, 1948, titledConcert de bruits.

Following musique concrète, other modernistart music composers such asRichard Maxfield,Karlheinz Stockhausen,Gottfried Michael Koenig,Pierre Henry,Iannis Xenakis,La Monte Young, andDavid Tudor, composed significant electronic, vocal, and instrumental works, sometimes using found sounds.^[58] In late 1947,Antonin Artaud recordedPour en Finir avec le Jugement de dieu (To Have Done with the Judgment of God), an audio piece full of the seemingly random cacophony ofxylophonic sounds mixed with variouspercussive elements, mixed with the noise of alarming human cries, screams, grunts,onomatopoeia, andglossolalia.^[61][62] In 1949,Nouveau Réalisme artistYves Klein wroteThe Monotone Symphony (formallyThe Monotone-Silence Symphony, conceived 1947–1948), a 40-minute orchestral piece that consisted of a single 20-minute sustained chord (followed by a 20-minute silence)^[63]—showing how the sound of onedrone could make music. Also in 1949,Pierre Boulez befriendedJohn Cage, who was visiting Paris to do research on the music ofErik Satie. John Cage had been pushing music in even more startling directions during the war years, writing for prepared piano, junkyard percussion, and electronic gadgetry.^[64]

In 1951, Cage'sImaginary Landscape #4, a work for twelve radio receivers, was premiered in New York. Performance of the composition necessitated the use of a score that contained indications for various wavelengths, durations, and dynamic levels, all of which had been determined usingchance operations.^[65][66]A year later in 1952, Cage applied hisaleatoric methods to tape-based composition. Also in 1952,Karlheinz Stockhausen completed a modestmusique concrète student piece entitledEtude. Cage's work resulted in his famous workWilliams Mix, which was made up of some six hundred tape fragments arranged according to the demands of theI Ching. Cage's early radical phase reached its height that summer of 1952, when he unveiled the first art "happening" atBlack Mountain College, and4'33", the so-called controversial "silent piece". The premiere of4'33" was performed byDavid Tudor. The audience saw him sit at the piano, and close the lid of the piano. Some time later, without having played any notes, he opened the lid. A while after that, again having played nothing, he closed the lid. And after a period of time, he opened the lid once more and rose from the piano. The piece had passed without a note being played, in fact without Tudor or anyone else on stage having made any deliberate sound, although he timed the lengths on a stopwatch while turning the pages of the score. Only then could the audience recognize what Cage insisted upon: that there is no such thing as silence. Noise is always happening that makes musical sound.^[67] In 1957,Edgard Varèse created on tape an extended piece of electronic music using noises created by scraping, thumping and blowing titledPoème électronique.^[68][69]

In 1960, John Cage completed his noise compositionCartridge Music for phono cartridges with foreign objects replacing the 'stylus' and small sounds amplified by contact microphones. Also in 1960,Nam June Paik composedFluxusobjekt for fixed tape and hand-controlled tape playback head.^[58] On May 8, 1960, six young Japanese musicians, includingTakehisa Kosugi andYasunao Tone, formed the Group Ongaku with two tape recordings of noise music:Automatism andObject. These recordings made use of a mixture of traditional musical instruments along with a vacuum cleaner, a radio, an oil drum, a doll, and a set of dishes. Moreover, the speed of the tape recording was manipulated, further distorting the sounds being recorded.^[70] Canada'sNihilist Spasm Band, the world's longest-running noise act, was formed in 1965 in London, Ontario, and continues to perform and record to this day, having survived to work with many of the newer generation which they themselves had influenced, such as Thurston Moore ofSonic Youth and Jojo Hiroshige ofHijokaidan. In 1967,Musica Elettronica Viva, a live acoustic/electronic improvisational group formed in Rome, made a recording titledSpaceCraft^[71] using contact microphones on such "non-musical" objects as panes of glass and motor oil cans that was recorded at the Akademie der Kunste in Berlin.^[72] At the end of the sixties, they took part in the collective noise action calledLo Zoo initiated by the artistMichelangelo Pistoletto.

Theart criticRosalind Krauss argued that by 1968 artists such asRobert Morris,Robert Smithson, andRichard Serra had "entered a situation the logical conditions of which can no longer be described as modernist."^[73]Sound art found itself in the same condition, but with an added emphasis ondistribution.^[74] Antiformprocess art became the terms used to describe thispostmodernpost-industrial culture and the process by which it is made.^[75] Seriousart music responded to this conjuncture in terms of intense noise, for example theLa Monte YoungFluxus composition89 VI 8 C. 1:42–1:52 AM Paris Encore fromPoem For Chairs, Tables, Benches, Etc. Young's compositionTwo Sounds (1960) was composed for amplified percussion and window panes and hisPoem for Tables, Chairs and Benches, Etc. (1960) used the sounds of furniture scraping across the floor.AllMusic assessed 1960s English experimental groupAMM as originators ofelectronica,free improvisation and noise music, writing that "noise bands owe it to themselves to check out their primary source."^[76]

Freak Out!, the 1966 debut album bythe Mothers of Invention made use of avant-gardesound collage—particularly the closing track "The Return of the Son of Monster Magnet".^[77] The same year, art rock groupthe Velvet Underground made their first recording while produced byAndy Warhol, a track entitled "Noise".^[78]AllMusic assessedthe Godz as an early noise band: "the three squalling bits ofavant-garde noise/junk they recorded from 1966–1968.^[79]

"Tomorrow Never Knows" is the final track ofthe Beatles' 1966 studio albumRevolver; credited as aLennon–McCartney song, it was written primarily byJohn Lennon with major contributions to the arrangement byPaul McCartney. The track includedlooped tape effects. For the track, McCartney supplied a bag of1⁄4-inch audio tape loops he had made at home after listening toStockhausen'sGesang der Jünglinge. By disabling theerase head of a tape recorder and then spooling a continuous loop of tape through the machine while recording, the tape would constantlyoverdub itself, creating a saturation effect, a technique also used inmusique concrète.^[80] The Beatles would continue these efforts with "Revolution 9", a track produced in 1968 forThe White Album. It made sole use ofsound collage, credited toLennon–McCartney, but created primarily byJohn Lennon with assistance fromGeorge Harrison andYoko Ono.^[81] In 2013,post-conceptual artistRutherford Chang released a double vinyl noise music record, in a limited edition of 800, calledWhite Album x 100 made by layering 100 copies of theBeatles’ 1968 double LPThe White Album playing simultaneously.^[82][83][84]

In 1967 theJefferson Airplane released a noisy sound collage calledA Small Package Of Value Will Come To You, Shortly on their albumAfter Bathing at Baxter's. In 1975,Ned Lagin released an album of electronic noise music full of spacey rumblings and atmospherics filled with burps and bleeps entitledSeastones onRound Records.^[85] The album was recorded instereo quadraphonic sound and featured guest performances by members of theGrateful Dead, includingJerry Garcia playing treated guitar andPhil Lesh playing electronicAlembicbass.^[86]David Crosby,Grace Slick and other members of theJefferson Airplane also appear on the album.^[87]

Lou Reed's double LPMetal Machine Music (1975) is cited as containing the primary characteristics of what would in time become a genre known as noise music.^[88] The album, recorded on a three speedUher machine and mastered/engineered byBob Ludwig,^[89] is an early, well-known example of commercial studio noise music that the music criticLester Bangs has sarcastically called the "greatest album ever made in the history of the humaneardrum".^[90] It has also been cited as one of the "worst albums of all time".^[91] In 1975, RCA also released aQuadrophonic version of theMetal Machine Music recording that was produced by playing the master tape back both forward and backward, and by flipping the tape over.^[92] Reed was well aware of thedrone music ofLa Monte Young and cites him as a major influence onMetal Machine Music.^[89][93][94] Young'sTheatre of Eternal Music was a proto-minimal music noise group in the mid-60s withJohn Cale,Marian Zazeela,Henry Flynt,Angus Maclise,Tony Conrad, and others.^[95] The Theatre of Eternal Music's discordant sustained notes and loud amplification had influenced Cale's subsequent contribution tothe Velvet Underground in his use of both discordance and feedback.^[96] Cale and Conrad have released noise music recordings they made during the mid-sixties, such as Cale'sInside the Dream Syndicate series (The Dream Syndicate being the alternative name given by Cale and Conrad to their collective work with Young).^[97]Krautrock bands such asNeu!^[98] andFaust^[99] would incorporate noise into their compositions. Roni Sarig, author ofThe Secret History of Rock calledCan's sophomore albumTago Mago "as close as it ever got to avant-garde noise music."^[100]

The aptly namednoise rock fusesrock to noise, usually with recognizable "rock" instrumentation, but with greater use of distortion and electronic effects, varying degrees ofatonality, improvisation, andwhite noise. One notable band of this genre isSonic Youth, who took inspiration from theNo Wave composersGlenn Branca andRhys Chatham (himself a student ofLa Monte Young).^[101] Marc Masters, in his book on the No Wave, points out that aggressively innovative early dark noise groups likeMars andDNA drew onpunk rock, avant-gardeminimalism andperformance art.^[102] Important in this noise trajectory are the nine nights of noise music calledNoise Fest that was organized byThurston Moore ofSonic Youth in the NYC art spaceWhite Columns in June 1981^[103][104] followed by theSpeed Trialsnoise rock series organized byLive Skull members in May 1983.

In the 1970s, the concept of art itself expanded and groups likeSurvival Research Laboratories,Borbetomagus andElliott Sharp embraced and extended the most dissonant and least approachable aspects of these musical/spatial concepts. Around the same time, the first postmodern wave of industrial noise music appeared with the Pop Group,^[105]Throbbing Gristle,Cabaret Voltaire, and NON (akaBoyd Rice).^[106] Thesecassette culture releases often featured zany tape editing, stark percussion and repetitive loops distorted to the point where they may degrade into harsh noise.^[107] In the 1970s and 1980s, industrial noise groups likeKilling Joke,Throbbing Gristle, Mark Stewart & the Mafia,Coil,Laibach,Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth,Smegma,Nurse with Wound andEinstürzende Neubauten performed industrial noise music mixing loud metal percussion, guitars, and unconventional "instruments" (such as jackhammers and bones) in elaborate stage performances. These industrial artists experimented with varying degrees of noise production techniques.^[108] Interest in the use ofshortwave radio also developed at this time, particularly evident in the recordings and live performances ofJohn Duncan. Otherpostmodern art movements influential to post-industrial noise art areConceptual Art and theNeo-Dada use of techniques such asassemblage,montage,bricolage, andappropriation. Bands likeTest Dept,Clock DVA,Factrix,Autopsia,Nocturnal Emissions,Whitehouse,Severed Heads, Sutcliffe Jügend, andSPK soon followed.The sudden post-industrial affordability of home cassette recording technology in the 1970s, combined with the simultaneous influence ofpunk rock, established theNo Wave aesthetic, and instigated what is commonly referred to as noise music today.^[108]

Since the early 1980s,^[109] Japan has produced a significant output of characteristically harsh artists and bands, sometimes referred to asJapanoise, with names such asGovernment Alpha, Alienlovers in Amagasaki and Koji Tano, and perhaps the best known beingMerzbow (pseudonym for the Japanese noise artistMasami Akita who himself was inspired by theDada artistKurt Schwitters'sMerz art project ofpsychologicalcollage).^[110][111] In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Akita tookMetal Machine Music as a point of departure and further abstracted the noise aesthetic by freeing the sound from guitar based feedback alone. According to Hegarty (2007), "in many ways it only makes sense to talk of noise music since the advent of various types of noise produced in Japanese music, and in terms of quantity this is really to do with the 1990s onwards ... with the vast growth of Japanese noise, finally, noise music becomes a genre".^[112] Other key Japanese noise artists that contributed to this upsurge of activity includeHijokaidan,Boredoms,C.C.C.C.,Incapacitants,KK Null,Yamazaki Maso'sMasonna,Solmania, K2,the Gerogerigegege andHanatarash.^[111][113] Nick Cain ofThe Wire identifies the "primacy of Japanese Noise artists like Merzbow, Hijokaidan and Incapacitants" as one of the major developments in noise music since 1990.^[114]

• An Anthology of Noise & Electronic Music Volumes 1–7Sub Rosa, Various Artists (1920–2012)
• Just Another Asshole #5 (1981) compilationLP (CD reissue 1995 on Atavistic #ALP39CD), producers:Barbara Ess andGlenn Branca
• No New York (1978)Antilles, (2006) Lilith, B000B63ISE
• The Japanese-American Noise Treaty (1995) CD, Relapse
• New York Noise hour music video television program

• Nor Noise 119 mins 2004 documentary film by Tom Hovinbole atUbuWeb.
• Noise A short noise music documentary film by N.O. Smith
• Freshwidow.comArchived 2009-10-11 at theWayback Machine,Marcel Duchamp playing and discussing his noiseready-madeWith Hidden Noise
• Paul Hegarty,Full With Noise: Theory and Japanese Noise Music^[usurped] onCTheory.net
• The Future of Music: Credo,John Cage (1937) fromSilence,John Cage, Wesleyan University Press
• Alphamanbeast's noise directory Information base with links to noise artists and labels
• White noise in wave(.wav) format (1 minute)^[usurped]
• UBU.armob.ca^[usurped]La Monte Young's89 VI 8 c. 1:42–1:52 AM Paris Encore (10:33) onTellus Audio Cassette Magazine archive hosted atUbuWeb
• Noise generator to explore different types of noise
• PNF-library.org,Free Noise Manifesto
• Torben Sangild: "The Aesthetics of Noise"
• UBU.com, mp3 audio files of the noise music ofLuigi Russolo onUbuWeb
• Noiseweb^[usurped]
• List of noise bands in the Noise Wiki created by noise artists for noise artists
• #13 Power Electronics atTellus Audio Cassette Magazine housed atUbuWeb
• MP3 files by harsh noise artists
• UBU.com,Wolf Vostell's De/Collage LPFluxus Multhipla, Italy (1980) atUbuWeb
• UBU.wfmu.org^[usurped], noise music ofAntonio Russolo fromTellus Audio Cassette Magazine
• Noise.as^[usurped], Noise: NZ/Japan
• UBU.artmob.ca^[usurped]Walter De MariaOcean Music (1968)
• Torben Sangild: "The Aesthetics of Noise"
• Japanoise.netArchived 2012-03-26 at theWayback Machine
• Dotdotmusic.com^[usurped], Paul Hegarty,General Ecology of Sound: Japanese Noise Music as Low Form (2005)
• UBU.artmob.ca^[usurped], audio excerpt fromThe Monotone Symphony byYves Klein
• UBU.com,Genesis P-Orridge on the origins ofThrobbing Gristle: interview byTony Oursler onUbuWeb
• UBU.com, Group Ongaku (1960–61) atUbuweb Recorded in 1960 & 1961 at Sogetsu Art Center, Tokyo
• RWM.macba.cat, mp3 radio lecture onFluxus noise music
• Continuo.wordpress.com, Sound recordings fromNicolas Schöffer's spatiodynamic sculptures sourced from the DVD of an exhibition at Espace Gantner, France, 2004, titledPrécurseur de l'art cybernétique.
• Marc Weidenbaum, "Classic Tellus Noise MP3s (Controlled Bleeding, Merzbow, etc.)",ClassicTellus Audio Cassette Magazine Noise
• Nam June Paik inUbuWeb Sound