Biography
Previous Industries, a hip-hop trio, delve into nostalgia, memory, and heartbreak. The lineup features Open Mike Eagle alongside Video Dave and Still Rift, three emcees whose longtime friendship yields an instinctive rapport. They trade offhand yet densely interlocked rhymes that conjure vintage video games, forgotten television spots, cartoons, and further fragments of their early years. Their first album, Service Merchandise, surfaced in 2024; both the project and every song take their titles from shuttered American retail chains.
Though all three members grew up in Chicago, they now reside in Los Angeles. Open Mike Eagle and Still Rift have been acquainted since high school, and Eagle first met Video Dave during college. The three formed a regular social circle amid the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns, gathering weekly for video game sessions while drawing on shared recollections of obsolete technology, which they mined from old magazines and catalogs. Video Dave and Still Rift later appeared on Eagle’s Component System with the Auto Reverse (2022) and Another Triumph of Ghetto Engineering (2023). After signing with Merge, the group issued its debut, Service Merchandise, in 2024, featuring production from Child Actor, Quelle Chris, and Smoke Bonito plus guest verses from Quelle Chris and Queen Herawin of the Juggaknots.
Though all three members grew up in Chicago, they now reside in Los Angeles. Open Mike Eagle and Still Rift have been acquainted since high school, and Eagle first met Video Dave during college. The three formed a regular social circle amid the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns, gathering weekly for video game sessions while drawing on shared recollections of obsolete technology, which they mined from old magazines and catalogs. Video Dave and Still Rift later appeared on Eagle’s Component System with the Auto Reverse (2022) and Another Triumph of Ghetto Engineering (2023). After signing with Merge, the group issued its debut, Service Merchandise, in 2024, featuring production from Child Actor, Quelle Chris, and Smoke Bonito plus guest verses from Quelle Chris and Queen Herawin of the Juggaknots.