01. Overture 24
02. Pretty
03. Enzymes
04. RNRC
05. Humane Industry
06. Pretty – Slow and Reverbed
Ache Tape’s ‘Humane Industry’ Is a Brutal, Industrial Wasteland of Noise and Fury
Ache Tape isn’t here to make you comfortable. The South East London duo’s latest EP, Humane Industry, is an iron-fisted assault of industrial chaos, bridging the gap between Nine Inch Nails’ dystopian dirges and Rage Against the Machine’s riot-starting swagger. It’s a six-track journey through mechanical rage, blistering guitar grind, and unfiltered lyrical venom, proving that frontman Ronove Orobas and co-conspirator Damien Serpentine are hell-bent on carving their own jagged niche into the industrial rock scene.
The EP opens with “Overture 24,” an instrumental that drips with tension. Synths swell and distort like sirens wailing in the distance, building to an explosive crescendo that sets the stage for what’s to come. That eruption arrives swiftly in “Pretty,” a track that pulsates with seething contempt for surface-level beauty. The lyrics—”Love me / fuck me / use me / ruin me”—hit like a sledgehammer, delivered with a sneer that calls to mind the nihilistic poetry of Trent Reznor at his most feral.
Then there’s “Enzymes,” another instrumental interlude, acting like a brief moment to catch your breath before the EP’s most unhinged moment—”RNRC” (short for “Rock ‘N’ Roll Cunts”). It’s a filthy, sneering punk-industrial hybrid, full of guttural growls and clanging metallic percussion. The chorus is a war cry, a middle finger to sanitized, overproduced rock, as Ronove Orobas snarls, “I rather repulse than be a rebound fuck.” If this track doesn’t get your head banging, you might already be dead inside.
The title track, “Humane Industry,” is where Ache Tape pulls back the curtain on the bleak, mechanical grind of modern life. “Satan is sad / God’s gone mad,” Orobas chants over punishing drum loops and razor-wire guitar lines, painting a picture of a world where algorithms dictate existence and individuality is crushed beneath the weight of progress. It’s an industrial nightmare wrapped in a chorus that lingers like a virus.
Closing the EP is “Pretty – Slow and Reverbed,” a haunting, drugged-out reimagining of the earlier track. If “Pretty” was a violent tantrum, this version is the eerie aftermath—a nightmarish, slow-motion descent into the void.
Humane Industry is not an easy listen, nor does it want to be. It’s raw, pissed off, and unapologetically abrasive, but it’s also thrilling in its commitment to sonic destruction. Ache Tape isn’t making music for the masses; they’re making music for the disillusioned, the furious, and the ones who find beauty in the wreckage.
And damn, it sounds good.
https://achetape.com
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