These 7 albums turn 20 this year

It’s almost hard to believe today that in 2000 VNV Nation remixed a song by Suicide Commando. The rift between those two styles of electronic music couldn’t feel further apart today.

But 2000 was such a monumental year for music that a remix like “Hellraiser” was possible. Everything felt harder, more emotional, more connected, more electronic than ever before.

Some of the most important and influential albums were released in 2000, and new branches of industrial music were taking off that would completely revamp the goth-industrial club scene.

Futurepop changed everything

It’s impossible to pinpoint the birth of futurepop, but 2000 was no doubt the year it exploded. Several artists who made electro-industrial music had already begun experimenting with undistorted vocals, synthpop-based song structures, and influences from trance.

The 1-2-3 punch that solidified the sound of futurepop was Welcome to Earth, United States of Mind, and Empires (which was followed in 2000 with a remix collection called Burning Empires that in my opinion has surpassed the legacy of the original). Those are 3 of my favorite albums of all time.

Futurepop changed everything. It revitalized a somewhat nascent club scene still reeling from the crossover success of industrial-rock. It also spawned a thousand new bands, many of whom are still active today.

Aggrotech takes hold

At the same time, aggrotech was firing on all cylinders. Claus Larsen’s Leæther Strip project was on a nearly 10-year hiatus at the time, but several artists inspired by his early work made music with harder, faster beats and heavily distorted vocals.

The development of those two new genres created a somewhat unfortunate divide between people who like aggressive music and those who like the more melodic side.

Personally, I still love both.

I just wanted to recognize that these albums that mean so much to me and other people who listen to this type of music are turning 20 this year.