It has been too long since Fear Factory put out new material in an
album format. Although previous to this new effort, Fear Factory had put
out “Hate Files” a “Greatest Hits” formatted album with four
tracks previously unreleased. “Concrete” was the first CD they had
ever recorded about a year before they put out “Soul Of A New
Machine” however most of the songs that appeared on “Concrete”
ended up on “SOANM”.
“Archetype” also represents the debut of
Christian Wolbers on guitar, formally their bass player turned guitar
player replaced founding member Dino Cazares. Fear Factory then tapped
Byron Stroud (Strapping Young Lad) as their new bass player.
Now, to my synopsis:
“Slave Labor”
This song goes with the great tradition of opening tracks of all Fear
Factory CD’s. No bullshit just straight up
aggression within 30 seconds. No unusually long intros that seem
to go no where. When you listen to this track you will hear all the Fear
Factory elements we’ve all grown to love. The sci-fi sounding
keyboards in the background, the precision kick drum work of Raymond
and how they blend perfectly with the guitar. This track is pound for
pound aggression. It’s at medium fast pace and it sounds like a
Fear Factory song.
“Cyberwaste”
I love the opening lyric to this song “NOTHING....YOU
SAY....MATTER’S...TO US!” then proceeds with “FUCK YOU!!!”. This
song represents anger towards another human being in such a blunt
fashion, i don’t think any band has been able to grasp this concept in
such a simple form. Anyone can relate to this opening line to
this song weather it be with your day job (in my case), family
situation, school, relationships, driving, or just about anything. This
song speaks to virtually everyone from any age. And this just scratches
the surface! This is the most aggressive song on this album with
absolute brilliant drumming, heavy guitars and an ever changing vocal
style. It’s no wonder they filmed a video for this song. The
verses in this song are sung in a single word style with lots of
aggression. You can’t help but to get into this song.
“Act Of God”
When listening to this song I can’t help but to think on how well this
song could have easily been on Demanufacture or Obsolete. This is
another typical sounding song by Fear Factory. With full of different
vocal mixtures of growling and actual singing. A vocal style in which
Burton Bell virtually invented. What differentiates this track from
other Fear Factory tracks is the explicit lyrics on religion. This
isn’t the first time they have touched on this topic for they covered
this topic with “Pisschrist” (demanufacture) and various tracks on
Obsolete.
Other than another great Fear Factory track, there this song is hard to
describe in which would distinguish it completely from other Fear
Factory songs.
“Archetype”
The catchiest song on this CD. Within listening to
the song twice, I was already singing the chorus. This song is a mixture
of the new Fear Factory sound and the old. It has melody it has
aggression. Burton really gets into the melodic portion of his singing
style that is very reminiscent of “Resurrection” which of course is
on “Obsolete”. Almost sounding like a modern rock song, it
stands as one of my favorite tracks on this disc.
“Undercurrent”
This is a shining example on how the new Fear
Factory “sound” sounds like. Almost modern rock in nature.
With out the limiting effect on the guitars as there typically is with
this band. This song has almost all the elements of Nu-metal without the
rap. It’s Intense in some parts but not nearly as intense as there is
in the other songs listed above. this is one of the songs you can sing
along to as your sitting in your chair reading the paper.
My final conclusion is simply that this album is
more than meets the eye. I had reservations about this album due to all
the politics within the band prior to having it recorded. Personally I
took Dino’s side of the story regarding him being fired so to speak
from the band. I bought the CD anyway to see how it sounded. And it is
to my surprise that it sounds great. Disappointed that the one
band member I met is no longer in the band, but life must go on. The
band must play on!
The first six tracks are %100 Fear Factory.
When you listen to those tracks you can immediately say “Fear
Factory”. Tracks seven through thirteen are of
what I call the new Fear Factory “sound” or as some might say it is
the evolution of the band. The remaining tracks on the CD are not
as fast as Fear Factory have gone in the past and they have more of a
slow sounding tone to them that is still relatively dark and most of the
tracks Burton is holding alot of notes when he sings in attempt to tap
more of the melodic parts to his vocal range. If anything, get this CD
for the first six tracks, they are smoking!
rating: 8.5/10
written
18.05.2004
by Matthew Haumschild
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