Why are we still using the term “Industrial?”

Does it even have any meaning? Did it ever? Originating in 1976 Throbbing Gristle’s makeshift independent record label, Industrial Records, gave a name to a style that featured avant garde noise and performance art. From Cabaret Voltaire to Whitehouse to Einstürzende Neubauten to Skinny Puppy “Industrial” always seemed to have a place as a descriptive term for edgy, artistically synthetic music.

And yet nowadays we’re tagging every techno act as Industrial. If it includes heavy guitars we call it “Industrial Rock” (?!). Hell, even I’m guilty of perpetuating this idea that anything hard and electronic is “Industrial” through my blog posts and reviews.

And yet, you talk to old schoolers and they get positively indignant about the use of the term. Just check out my interview with Mark Spybey. In his view the word never meant much of anything from the beginning.

Artists tend to publicly shy away from these descriptive terms in regard to their own music and yet I often hear or read them using these same terms to describe other acts. Are genre/subgenre/microgenre titles so important? Do they operate as effective designations which give people some idea of what to expect from the music?

Or is it time to bury the word “Industrial” for good and start from scratch? I’ve heard that “Electro” is making a comeback. Will it bring the funk back with it?