Throughout its 30 year history, the band has largely operated as a collective, not only by employing a rotating membership, but also often collaborating with other musicians and artists both live and on record.

The instruments themselves can be heavy and foreboding "self-made from antiquated machines and scrap metal, forged at extreme angles like props from a German expressionist film.

"[1] A reviewer once said of the band: "Neptune really do accurately approximate in their music the tragic and violent desolation of the auto graveyards from which they draw their raw materials.

"[3] Neptune's origins trace to 1994[4] as a sculpture project by Boston artist/musician Jason Sanford, who forged the band's haphazard guitars and reluctant drums from scrap steel and found objects.

Over the years the instruments have evolved to incorporate oscillators and other electronic devices as band "have integrated some really smart looking industrial class synthesizer gear"[5] into their noise-making arsenal.