19-02-2010Album reviews - Mechanize

Released 9-02-10 - Rocksnail Rating 3/5

For those of you that have read my Blast from the Past piece on Fear Factory’s ‘Soul of a New Machine’, you’ll already know what my thoughts of latter day FF are so I’m not going to re-cover old ground. Let's just say FF’s last couple of albums 'weren’t for me'.
 
I’ve got to be honest, the rejoining of Dino ‘Porn King’ Cazares last summer took me a little by surprise, especially if you listen to the lyrics on 'Archetype' which were aimed at Cazares. From what I could gather, his parting all those years ago was on the acrimonious side and FF saw Christian Olde Wolbers switch from bass to guitar and the recruitment of long standing Devin Townsend cohort Byron Stroud  filled four string duties. Present day 2010, the SYL rhythm section of Stroud and the aptly nicknamed ‘Atomic Clock’ that is the mighty Gene Hoglan are back together again and GH makes his recording debut with the digi obsessed Factory of Fear. That alone really tweaked my interest as he is one of the leading timekeepers of our generation. Whatever is going on behind the scenes with previous drummer Raymond Herrera and Olde Wolbers is still shrouded in mud and conjecture so we’ll leave that aspect well alone for the time being. So…roll on Mechanize.

And?
 
Well, feel wise, ‘Mechanize’ has taken me right back to ‘Demanufacture’ which is no bad thing at all, only the material doesn’t seem to have the same amount of aggressive bite that ‘De…’ displayed all those years ago.  It's extremely slick sounding with the usual FF hi definition production however their usual ott drum triggering has taken GH's characteristic battering and turned it into a cold digital metronome sadly lacking his normal personality. Unless you are a drum nerd like me, very few people would know it wasn’t Raymond playing by just listening to the overall sound. The playing is a different matter but that’s a different subject altogether. That aside there are some quality moments on 'Mechanize' however they aren’t consistent enough for my liking. The opener and album title track does explode into life as you would expect but unfortunately it just doesn’t scratch my itch like 'Martyr' did all those years ago. It's not as far off the mark for me as say  the extremely disappointing 'Transgression', the patchy 'Digimortal', or even as 'Archetype' was, as where 'Archetype' had the simply awesome 'Cyberwaste', 'Mechanize' has the likes of  the pretty impressive 'Powershifter', the heavily Meshuggah inspired timing arrangement of 'Designing the Enemy' and the older, more welcome sounding 'Oxidizer' however the high points are balanced out by the dreary wet lettuce 8mins and 14 seconds that is 'Final Exit' – half limp wristed and impotent dross, half pointless soundscapes.
 
I do however believe that the bonus track I got on mine – a re-recorded 'Crash Test' from debut album 'Soul of a New Machine' is quite excellent, especially with the added blasting from GH under Burton's growling chorus. Now that’s how you do it boys. Give me an album of that kind of material and I'll be firmly back on board. I believe there is a similar re-recorded version of 'Martyr' and their Concrete album track 'Sangre de Ninos',  both of which are knocking around in the wings waiting to be unleashed. Now these, girls and boys, I have to hear.
 
All in all, Fear Factory have released a far better collection of songs through 'Mechanize' with some real ear catching material within it, far more so than can be compared with their previous few releases. If you're a true die hard FF fan, you'll no doubt love it. I personally however, still have my arms outstretched, begging them to blow me away like they first did to win me back on side.