Review Summary: Industrial influenced rock from France for free. Not much can go wrong but just listen to "Pigface" and move on.
Fresh Body Shop is an industrial influenced rock band from France. This project is what one can only assume is mostly a one man operation. Most of the blogs on his MySpace are in French so I can’t decipher them enough to get more background information. Most of the production of the album was done by the front man but he does have a live band that helps him play live shows. Coming from France, all the lyrics are in English which makes for a pretty enjoyable listen for free. That’s right I said free. Do yourself a favor, if you like any kind of industrial rock follow this link right now and download it: http://www.jamendo.com/en/album/6339.
The songs differ in sound. The album opener “Draw The Circle” opens with a simple guitar riff and doesn’t sound that industrial. Number three is where the album picks itself up off the ground. “The Hunt” sounds like some mellowed down, early Trent Reznor creation. It is by far one of the most industrial off the album and it’s a really good listen too. “My Artificial Sun” starts out with heavy laden guitars and then splits off into a pop-rocky chorus with some industrial influence behind it. It is arguably one of the most “famous” Fresh Body Shop songs if you want to say that. The middle song and title track “The Ugly Army” keeps on with the industrial influence of this band. It has some cool beats along with a very random acoustic guitar section that they decided to throw in there. Lyrics like “they won’t give up; my army’s made of steel” help this out in being one of the better songs on the album.
“Anything But You” is more so a waste of time. It is boring bland and after 5 previous tracks it brings nothing new to the table and it sounds more like funk rock than anything. The next song however is the album winner in my opinion. “Pigface” starts out with a cool bass line that continues throughout the entire song. It has some pretty standard drum beats but you could easily mistake it for an early Nine Inch Nails song. It clocks in at only a minute and half which is too short but it makes up in quality. This is the most industrial song off the album and it’s the only one I would probably listen to repeatedly. “Never End Up Like This” is a bland rock song with a bass line and guitar work that you’ve heard oh so many times. It has some weird electronic thrown in there that makes it bearable but do yourself a favor and skip over it. The album closer “One More Reason” gives me one more reason to hope that the album is almost over.
Being that this is an entirely free album you can’t go wrong here. Download it and pick out the winners for yourself. I think the best ones are “Pigface”, “The Hunt” and “The Artificial Sun” but the choice is yours. The album also comes in at 22 and a half minutes so it won’t take too much time out of your day if you want to listen to some decent industrial influenced rock. Listen to this if you like Nine Inch Nails but please do not compare this guy’s work to Trent’s, that wouldn’t even be fair.
