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i quite like whitehouse, and i think they broke tons of ground both stylistically and musically; but i find myself liking ramleh or sutcliffe jügend a whole lot more.
part of their appeal for me is that it is too much of it's time while being ahead of it's time; meaning nobody sounded like them when they started (the distorted synth barrage, the high pitched electronical screeches and the vocal attack) but it has become so much as being part of a post-pistols, thatcher britain that i often think of them as a nostalgia act. they were all about report stuff like the yorkshire ripper and the nazi aesthetics of london underground punk but never commenting on it, it's like a time capsule.
another part of their appeal to me is that, in said chronicals, they go to the deep end like nothing before, there's a bit of a scary movie part, listening to stuff about rape and serial killers; listening to the lunatic minds of fringe people you're not supposed to know about for your own good (of course, all being an act).
after all, they are pretty entertaining and you can count on them to deliver what you know they do well (except for racket, which i have avoided like the plague). they did influence merzbow and hijokaidan back in the day and established power electronics into a proper sub genre (so to speak) which has given more extreme bands like grunt and taint.
they do push an agenda and always have, like glice noted, and when that happens, people tend to divide into followers and rejectionists; when it comes to whitehouse, both sides tend to go to great extremes. to me, what's very interesting is that there's a lot of people who are not taken by either side, preferring to stay in the middle, enjoying their tyrades and not taking their neurological programming and morbosity drenched spiel very seriously.
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