Test Dept

Test Dept
Maschinenfest 2016
Background information
Origin	New Cross, UK
Genres	Industrial
Years active	1981-1997, 2016-
Labels	Some Bizzare Records
Past members	Graham Cunnington Paul Jamrozy Jonathan Toby Burdon Paul Hines Angus Farquhar Alistair Adams Neil Starr John Eacott Andy Cowton Tony Cudlip David Coulter Gus Ferguson Martin King

Test Dept. were an industrial music group from London, one of the most important and influential early industrial music acts. Their approach was marked by the use of "found" material, re-constructed to better serve their purpose, of making "more" with "less".

The band played again in 2016 as Test Dept: Redux and will release a new album as Test Dept. in 2017.

The group formed in the London suburb of New Cross in 1981. The core members of the group were Graham Cunnington, Paul Jamrozy, Jonathan Toby Burdon, Paul Hines and Angus Farquhar. Other members who played with the group at various times included Alistair Adams, Neil Starr, John Eacott, Andy Cowton, Tony Cudlip, David Coulter, Gus Ferguson and Martin King. Comedian Vic Reeves played bass in an early incarnation of the band. The band signed to Some Bizzare Records, a label connected to acts like Depeche Mode, Soft Cell, PTV, Foetus, and Swans. The slides and film for Test Dept multi-media events were made by visual director Brett Turnbull.

Their discography spans a wide variety of influences and styles, including a collaboration with the South Wales Striking Miners Choir in support of the miners' strike of 1984. They were particularly notable for complex and powerful percussion, as well as high-energy live performances. Like the German band Einstürzende Neubauten, another Some Bizzare label signing with whom they are often compared, Test Dept used unconventional instruments such as scrap metal and industrial machinery as sound sources; however, Test Dept's use of these objects was far more rhythmic than was Neubauten's, and was often accompanied by film and slide shows. The group were noted for large-scale events in unusual site-specific locations, such as Waterloo station, Cannon Street station, Stirling Castle and the disused St Rollox Railway Works in Glasgow.

The band's album The Unacceptable Face of Freedom was praised by a music reviewer for The New York Times, claiming the album was notable for a "sophisticated use of sound-collage techniques and the helter-skelter momentum of its cyclical rhythms".