Front 242

Front 242 were formed in Aarschot, Belgium, by Daniel Bressanutti and Dirk Bergen in 1981. Together they produced the first single "Love Me Tonight" (released October 1981). Jean-Luc De Meyer (vocals) and Patrick Codenys (synth) were looking for support from Daniel to complete the first single in their Under Viewer project. Daniel asked them to work on the second single "The Best Of Black Sabbath" (released April 1982) and on Front 242. Richard Jonckheere (Richard 23) was not yet an official member of the group but already had a small singing part in the song "U.Men". The first album "Geography" followed in December 1982. Richard 23 was increasingly integrated into the group, especially because of his presence on stage. In contrast, Richard criticized the lack of this imposing presence in Dirk. Dirk then took over management but then left the band in April 1983. With this line-up, the band released many albums of EBM, gaining more popularity with every release.

EBM stands for Electronic Body Music, a term first used on their album "No Comment" appearing on the inner sleeve, but not used as or considered as a genre name yet. The term was actually established as a genre through a marketing concept by promoter Jens-Markus Wegener. It was strongly pushed to German media to promote the SPV compilation [m11378] in 1987/1988. Sometimes the term itself is also credited to Kraftwerk from an interview in 1978, but according to Wegener the Kraftwerk reference wasn’t known at that time neither to him nor Front 242.

They also established a solid live reputation with an energetic show in para-military outfits. The year 1993 brought a radical change in style, with guest musicians, the disappearance of their military look and the exploration of both harder (guitar samples) and softer (female vocals, ambient) sounds. After many years of silence, except for a few live/remix albums, Front 242 re-appeared in the spotlight in the late nineties with their "RE:BOOT" tour bringing modern, techno-like cover versions of their own songs. In 2003, they took a step back towards their EBM roots with the release of "Pulse" and "Still & Raw".

Before Front 242, the members were already involved in other projects, like Prothese (Daniel B.), Under Viewer (Jean-Luc De Meyer & Patrick Codenys) and Tranik Ind. (Richard 23).