The name Fear Factory is one that gathers appreciation and respect amongst both the mainstream and the more underground metal hordes. The first will have liked
Obsolete and the fairly weak
Digimortal; the former will prefer earlier work like
Soul Of A New Machine or even their grind/death debut,
Concrete. 1998’s
Obsolete was the album that marked the transition between the two phases.
For
Obsolete, Fear Factory’s lineup was comprised of:
Dino Cazares – guitar
Burton C.Bell – vocals
Raymond Herrera - drums
Christian Olde-Wolbers – bass
Rhys Fulber – samples and looping*
*not an official band member.
Apart from the band’s musicians, Gary Numan has a cameo doing a spoken-word intro and there are some guest musicians.
One look at
Obsolete will tell you that this is a concept album. The story takes place in the distant future, in the usual apocalyptic, machine-driven society. Somewhere on Earth, a totalitarian regime is in practice. But this regime, like all dictatorial regimes, has its detractors. The main one is a guy called Edgecrusher, who affirms himself as the leader of the opposition. One day, Edgecrusher is addressing a crowd when suddenly he has to go on the run: both the Securitron police and the dreaded Smasher/Devourer are out to get him. He then basically spends the entire record running from them, but in the end is caught and thrown in jail, annihilating all hopes of freedom for men. The story, despite somewhat clichéd, is perfectly suited to the group’s sound and actually quite interesting. If you read the booklet, it is presented to you in the form of a movie script, with the lyrics intertwined in the story itself. Overall, a very well-done concept.
But the thing that matters the most here is the music. And it also delivers in spades. The mixture of death, thrash and nu-metal with subtle electronic elements, which is the group’s trademark, is honed to perfection. As for Bell’s vocals, they are either fittingly aggressive or disarmingly melodic, almost ingenuous at times. Which is almost ironic, since the lyrics are anything
but ingenuous: most of them are aggressively shouted statements of intentions from the characters in the story. The problem, then, is that not all the songs have the most attractive choruses. Some of them are just plain forgettable, like
Descent. Fortunately, the huge chorus section in
Edgecrusher and the often-repeated chorus in
Smasher/Devourer more than make up for those blander moments. Nevertheless, this is not a chorus-driven album; don’t expect an easy listen.
The album kicks off with
Shock, which is a declaration of intentions from Edgecrusher. This song starts with an electronic effect going from one speaker to the other, which leads into a great intro riff. Burton then comes in singing of inconformity and rebellion in his raspy voice. For the chorus, however, he momentarily switches to his clear register. Something noteworthy is that the chorus of this song is one of the few moments when Burton’s two vocal registers mingle; usually, they are quite separate entities, wisely escaping the nu-metal cliché of mixing them both. All in all, this is a great start to the album, which sets some of its themes and introduces us to the story.
(4,5/5)
Every FF fan knows this next song.
Edgecrusher is one of the most famous songs in the group’s repertoire and it boasts probably the best chorus on this album. It’s simple but insanely catchy:
Quote:
|
Break of the Edge-crusher, break of the Edgecrusher, break of the Edge-crusherrrr
|
Dumb it may be, but it’s also extremely appealing. The riffing is once again excellent, and overall this is one hell of a great song. By the way, Edgecrusher’s on the run by now.
(5/5)
The third song introduces us to its titular character,
Smasher/Devourer. As he chases Edgecrusher, he spews out a very characteristical litany:
Quote:
I am the way
Prepare for salvation
|
Of course, this is exactly the type of speech you would expect to hear from both a totalitarian society and an organized form of religion: binding, controlling and brainwashing. Musically, it keeps with the theme of the album, although it gives more prominence to the group’s death-metallic side. Overall, another great song, although the chorus is a bit overused.
(5/5)
Securitron (Police State 2000) is the next entity to start chasing Edgecrusher. This is where the album’s choruses start to falter, as this one is much blander than any of the previous three. Still, this song is made better by its catchy riffing, and overall is not a bad song.
(4/5)
Descent starts off on a very melodic riff, and when Burton comes in singing, even his vocal register is lighter than on the other songs. This gives the album a bit of added variety, as well as managing to capture our interest. Unfortunately, the chorus is a virtual nonentity, which detracts a lot from the song. It does, however, still deserve
(4,5/5).
Hi-Tech Hate is one of the most nondescript songs on the album. It sounds exactly like every other song on here, with nothing to set it apart from the others. It also never fully captures our attention, making this one of the blander moments on this album.
(2,5/5)
Fortunately,
Freedom Or Fire represents The Return Of The Chorus. In what is once again a declaration of intentions from our hero Edgecrusher, the chorus is dumb but insanely catchy, basically consisting of the song title repeated twice J. This is a song that re-captures our interest and fires us up for the last few songs on this album. Great.
(4,5/5)
Obsolete features the Gary Numan intro, leading into another catchy nu-metallish riff. The first verse has a somewhat airy felling to it, but soon it develops into one of the most purely metal tracks on the album, where the clean vocals are barely used at all. This track has a tremendous groove and – once again – one hell of a great chorus. It’s a track worthy of sitting up there with the first few on the album.
(4,5/5)
Resurrection starts off with a Hollywood-soundtrack felling to it, and when Burton C.Bell’s vocals come in, we can’t help but be amazed – he sounds like one of those whiny post-grunge guys. Pretty soon, of course, all hell breaks loose, in a more melodic way than before, but still very effective. The main riff could have been Nirvana, but once again Burton’s vocals (whose two registers mingle again in this song) tell us that it’s FF we’re talking about here. The chorus sounds almost like something Incubus might have wrote (*shudder*), but it’s not as prominent as others on this album. All in all, a song that’s worth listening to basically because it’s different from all the others – it even features orchestrations! - , and also very good, despite the relative absence of chorus.
(4,5/5)
Timelessness closes the album, with Edgecrusher already rotting in jail. The first seconds are once again ethereal, with vague echoes of distant voices echoing in both our speakers. The rest of the song comes across as a calmer moment on this album, with Burton’s vocals casting a nearly foreboding aura. We can almost
sense Edgecrusher’s fear and despair, yet his vocals are never overdone, despite their definite melodic nature. A nice, relaxing way to close a very good album, and also something slightly different from the album’s musical pattern.
(4/5)
Overall, then, this is a pretty good album. I confess that I was going to give it a lower grade at first, but then after listening to it more attentively, I actually liked what I heard. So I’m giving it a very honourable four out of five stars.
Recommended Tracks:
Edgecrusher
Smasher/Devourer
Obsolete
