25 years ago today! Atari Teenage Riot released their debut album “Delete Yourself!” on their own label Digital Hardcore Recordings. Tracks like “Speed”, “Kids Are United”, “Start The Riot”, “Hunt Down And Kill The Nazis” and “Midijunkies” described a dystopian future, a modern surveillance state, the rise of far right and neo nazi ideology, censorship of Free Speech and terrorism. Established music critics immediately attacked the album for being too ‘harsh’, too ‘noisy’, too ‘violent’, too ‘direct’, too ‘loud’. What many don’t remember is that it was already finished in 1993. The major label Phonogram/Vertigo UK had signed ATR in 1992 and when they heard the mastered album, they refused to release it, fired the A&R who had signed the band and even better... they kicked ATR out, ripped up the deal. Usually bands in that situation would split up and vanish. But Alec Empire, Hanin Elias and Carl Crack didn‘t have another choice. They were pretty much blacklisted in the German techno scene. And when they played shows in punk rock clubs, the audiences rioted because they were ‘using computers’ on stage. Back then punks believed that an Atari computer was a symbol of the capitalist system that would replace humans in the work place... and worse. Cyberpunks and hackers were a tiny scene from which ATR emerged. BBC Radio DJ John Peel started playing the record and kept pushing it. Artists like Björk, Moby, The Prodigy and many others started to embrace it. Two years later in 1997 it was released in the US on the Beastie Boys label Grand Royal under the title “Burn Berlin Burn”. Many streaming services have lately banned ATR from their catalogue (or removed various songs from it). Remember you can always access it on the band’s bandcamp. https://atariteenageriot.bandcamp.com/album/delete-yourself-remastered Do you think Atari Teenage Riot’s view of where society was heading was wrong? #atariteenageriot #atr #deleteyourself #electronicmusic #digitalhardcore #dhr #cyberpunk #techno #breakbeat #drumnbass #rave #theprodigy #moby #björk #beastieboys #90s #johnpeel #berlin #london #usa #anniversary #25 #speed #fastandfurious #1995 https://www.instagram.com/p/B9HWPd-iHE9/?igshid=1mawwiktw7xh6
