Laibach: Ruffling Feathers

For the third part of his psychedelic trilogy, Luke Haines pays tribute to Suicide, Andy Warhol, Lou Reed, William Burroughs and the rest of the red-eyed freaks that stalked the mean streets of 1970s New York

Let’s get this straight: David Bowie was the godhead of 1970s electronic music. It was through him that electronic music was understood by a mass audience. His unique ability to synthesise, in both senses of the word, opened up pop music and revealed new ways of creating it, ways which would rapidly mutate and produce beautiful (and gloriously ugly) offspring in quick succession.

Electronic psychonauts Gnod operate out of Islington Mill, a Grade II listed Victorian cotton mill in Salford that has somehow escaped the gentrification tidal wave and now houses a vibrant community of musicians, labels, artists, designers, photographers and printers. Gnod’s charismatic lynchpin Paddy Shine takes us on a tour of the unique building at the epicentre of a creative revolution

“So we found out about CBGB’s and we found out about Patti Smith and The Ramones and Television, and we knew that there was something going on” – Chris Frantz