Nitzer Ebb - Recent Years and Reunion

Recent Years and Reunion

The band having quietly split, its back catalogue began to appear in DJ sets and mix compilations, and its name would appear in interviews with house and techno producers (which only served to highlight their enduring influence). In recognition of this development, NovaMute released a remix series with three 12-inch singles between 2001 and 2004—“Shame”/“Join in the Chant,” “Control, I'm Here”/“Let Your Body Learn,” and “Murderous”/Control, I'm Here.” The remix of “Let Your Body Learn” was particularly fruitful as it was given a radical overhaul by French techno producer Terence Fixmer, which led first to a friendship and then developed into a recording project between Fixmer and Douglas McCarthy, called simply Fixmer/McCarthy. Live performances (with just a mike and a Macintosh) around the world followed, which included new versions of Nitzer Ebb songs. This also led to an album released in 2004 as Fixmer/McCarthy, titled Between the Devil..., which captured the raw intensity of early Nitzer Ebb.

In late 2005, it was announced that McCarthy and Harris (now residing in the US, and producing and engineering Marilyn Manson and Billy Corgan) had begun to talk about the possibility of a Nitzer Ebb reunion. The group toured during 2006, which enlisted the services of drummer Kourtney Klein and focused on the more electronic phase of its career, with Mute Records finally releasing the 2 CD set Body of Work, 1984–1997 in June 2006. A companion piece, Body Rework, featuring remixes from cutting edge contemporary techno artists such as Motor, Black Strobe, the Hacker, Derrick May, and Robag Wruhme, was also released.

Capitalizing on the success of the 2006 world tour, Nitzer Ebb began work on new material in Los Angeles early in 2007, with a retrospective documentary still in the pipeline. During 2007, Nitzer Ebb continued its trend of replacing drummers as Kourtney Klein left the band to be replaced by one-time cohort Jason Payne. A first track, "Once You Say," with Depeche Mode songwriter Martin L. Gore on backing vocals, was played in June 2007 by Dave Clarke in his White Noise show on VPRO's 3 Voor 12. This track, along with "Payroll," were debuted live as Nitzer Ebb played a handful of shows and festivals during 2007. These tracks are featured on Nitzer Ebb's newest album, Industrial Complex.

McCarthy and Harris reunited up with Jason Payne and producer Flood to finish up the first new Nitzer Ebb record in over a decade. In the meantime, Fixmer/McCarthy released its second album in June 2008, Into the Night.

The band announced a US tour for fall–winter 2009 and were selected as the opening act of the January and February European and Russian dates of Depeche Mode's Tour of the Universe in 2010.

Nitzer Ebb's Ninth album "Industrial Complex" was released in 2010. Reviews were mostly positive with NME giving it 8 out of 10 stars and saying "..Nitzer Ebb prove they’re far from obsolete." and Lithium Magazine saying that fans "...are going to be in for quite a surprise when they hear this new stuff – it’s totally bad-ass."