LAB REPORT SHOW AND THE ATG
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The following is from the KICKSTARTER.
My name is Matt Schultz. I am a founding member of Lab Report and was also an original member of Pigface. In 1990, during the early years of the American industrial and post-punk movement, I created a custom-built instrument called the ATG, or Anti-Tank Guitar.
The ATG was not a novelty or a prop. It was a purpose-built instrument designed to generate extreme textures, low-frequency mass, and mechanical resonance that traditional guitars could not produce. That sound became a core sonic element of Lab Report and was used with Pigface. It shaped the dark ambient, industrial, and gothic landscapes. The ATG appeared on more than nine albums and helped define a very specific era of experimental music.
Martin Atkins, who was the owner of Invisible Records, the label my original band Lab Report was signed to, asked me to be part of Pigface, and the ATG was used extensively in both bands during that period. Those collaborations, recordings, and performances included that instrument and its unique voice.
Over time, the original ATG was dismantled and cannibalized. Parts were reused, modified, or lost. Eventually, the instrument ceased to exist entirely. There is no surviving version of the original ATG anywhere. What remains are the recordings, the memories, and its impact on the music.
Recently, I traveled to Chicago to visit Martin at the Museum of Post-Punk and Industrial Music. That meeting was the first time we had spoken face-to-face since the mid 1990s. I shared photos from that visit on social media, and the response was immediate and overwhelming. Across platforms, people commented that they wished the original ATG still existed and that they missed Lab Report.
Those responses sparked a deeper conversation between Martin and me. We realized that the ATG was not just my instrument. It was a missing artifact from industrial music history. We decided that if I rebuilt the ATG exactly as it was originally constructed, I could reform Lab Report and bring that sound back to life with a live performance at the Museum of Post-Punk and Industrial Music. This would be the first time the original ATG and Lab Report will have performed in over 30 years. To sweeten the deal, Tristan Rudat will be VJ the event with footage he and I worked on.
This project is about rebuilding the ATG from the ground up, matching the original design, materials, and intent as closely as possible. It is about preservation, reconstruction, and honoring a lost instrument that helped shape a genre.
With this Kickstarter, I am offering many levels to support the project with a variety of rewards that build on each other. At the second-to-highest level, I am offering 2 downloaded albums, 1 hard copy CD, a T-shirt, and 1 ticket to the limited private performance for 30 people at the Museum of Post-Punk and Industrial Music with Tristan Rudat as VJ on June 6, 2026.* If it sells out, a matinee will be added that afternoon for another 30.
At the highest Tier, I will make you an ATG for yourself!
This project is not about nostalgia. It is about restoring a missing piece of industrial music history and letting that sound exist again, in the place where its story belongs.
* The venue and date may be changed without notice. No refunds.
