Inertia

Inertia is a London-based British EBM and electro-industrial group active from 1994. The project forms around Reza Udhin, who also plays keyboards in Killing Joke. The band’s line-up includes Reza Udhin, Alexys B, Andrew Trail and Bob Malkowski, with Mark Barrett, Eddie Tempest, Alexys Dimetra Becerra, Ed Luxmoore, Bob Malkowski, Andrew Trail and Reza Udhin listed among its members.

Formation and early releases

The band forms in 1992 and signs to Germany’s Celtic Circle Productions in 1994. Its debut mini-CD, Infiltrator, appears in 1995 as a re-recording of the group’s first demo tape. That release gains strong reviews in Europe, the UK and the USA and becomes a club hit.

Inertia makes its first European live appearance in September 1995 at Celtic Circle’s Night of Darkness festival at the Kulturfabrik in Krefeld, Germany. The band then plays further dates in Switzerland, Germany and Belgium, and appears at Wave Gotik Treffen in Leipzig in April 1996.

Albums, singles and remixes

In 1996 the band begins work on the album Programmed to Respond and the mini-CD Mind-Energy. Mind-Energy is released in December 1996, followed by Programmed to Respond in February 1997. Both releases perform well in Europe and the USA.

The group issues the remix album Demagnetized/Remagnetized in 1999, with contributions from acts including Das Ich, Spahn Ranch and Julian Beeston of Nitzer Ebb. Later that year it releases the album Negative Prime on Nightbreed Recordings. A remix release, Positive Angel, appears on the band’s own label, Cryonica Music.

Other releases include the single No Defect, the album Advanced Revelation, Black Ice Impact in 2004, the double-disc compilation Decade of Machines in 2005, the self-titled album Inertia in 2007, and the remix album Interpret in 2009 on Deathwatch Asia. Interpret includes remixes by Youth, Die Krupps and Armageddon Dildos.

Tours and live activity

Inertia tours extensively in Europe and the USA through the late 1990s and 2000s. It completes a mini US tour in 1997, a full US tour later that year with Das Ich, a UK tour in 1998, a Scandinavian tour in 1999, a UK tour with Spahn Ranch in 1999, a second USA tour in 2000, a seven-week US tour with Project-X in 2001, East Coast and West Coast US tours in 2003 and 2004, and a six-week USA tour in 2007. The band also tours widely across the UK and Europe in 2008.

Recognition

Gary Numan describes Inertia as the best and most aggressive band in London.