Fear Factory is an American Metal band. So far they have released four full
albums, which I'll describe later, plus almost 10 singles collecting unreleased
tracks, remixes or just songs taken from these albums.
I think I first heard about them with their second album DEMANUFACTURE
released somewhere in 95. As a funny story, it all started by coincidence : for
my brother's birthday, I gave him this album, picking it up in the store only
because I liked the cover pic :) First my brother was a bit disappointed by
such unexpected gift (at that time none of us actually knew the band !) but
soon enough he came to like it and I rushed into the same feeling. Then we
attended a FF gig (for Fear Factory of course) in Strasbourg. It was 96, I was
in the army (beurk) and my first tatoo was only some days old, meaning slamming
was hurtful every, say, ten seconds :). The concert was just perfect, great
atmosphere and blasting sound, a great memory !
In 1999, we came back to attend another FF concert after the release of
their latest album OBSOLETE and tho as good and enjoyable as 3 years earlier,
we started to realize that there were a lot MORE people in the now too small
and hot concert hall !
This year is FF's 10th birthday and as a gift they have decided to release a
DVD. Like many other Metal stuff, it wasn't easy to get our hands on a copy and
my brother actually had to go shopping a hundred kms away to hope and find this
copy (today he's back there, trying to find another copy for me :). Btw if you
feel interested in this DVD let me tell you that you'll have to spend 30 euros.
Too expensive in my eyes but I really love the band and have strong memories
about the two concerts we went to.
Run Connection ....
Checking login and password ........ ... . . .
D I G I T A L C O N N E C T I V I T Y
There are several ways to view this DVD : either you run the four main
sections individually or you go for the whole of them at once, seeing FF's full
evolution over the last decade. Each section is dedicated to an album, showing
concerts footage, all sorts of loony videos shot on tours, videos and a handful
of static photos.
1. Soul Of A New Machine
This first album sets FF's background and identity with a lot of industrial
noises as introductions or in the background. This first album hits you right
in the face with Burton C Bell low voice, Raymond Herrera's ultra fast drumming
and ravaging guitars parts courtesy of Dino Cazares. Fear Factory's bass player
Christian Olde Wolbers joined them from the second album only. It reminds me a
lot of early Napalm Death albums.
2. Demanufacture
Fierce as ever FF comes back with what is still considered their best album
ever. DEMANUFACTURE plays as loud as S.O.A.N.M. but there's an electronic touch
to it this time with discreet tekno beats reinforcing the usual theme of the
Electronic Human carried by FF. The digipack edition is really nice with 3
bonus tracks. The main difference with their first album is that now you can
feel them grow more mature, tunes are better structured and still wild like
hell !
Bonus : video of "replica"
3. Obsolete
This third albums witnesses a deep evolution of FF : first it may seem a bit
less brutal than previous tries (could it be that I don't define "brutal" the
way most ppl do ? :). Then, some tracks are really slow and melodic what may
find some Metal extremists mad at. Above all this album was written like a
movie, each tune telling a different part of the story. Once again we feel FF's
will to explore the digital world, with a lot of songs telling that "Man is
obsolete, erase, extinct". This is a machine VS human war and I suggest you pay
attention to the lyrics of these songs as there's plenty to learn from.
Bonus : video of "Resurrection"
video of "Cars"
4. Digimortal
Their latest album shows another evolution of FF with still unchanged
elements like fast drumming and low pitched voice, but also parts featuring
some rapper, original parts, even nostalgic. This album is great as far as
singning is concerned since you feel Burton C. Bell has learnt to master all
the possibilities his voice offers.
Bonus : video of "Linchpin"
D V D D E T A I L E D C O N T E N T S
When you run the DVD you are presented with an amateur video first. Not easy
to understand it all as the DVD has no language nor subtitle options at all :(
Then it goes faster with a lot of excerpts from concerts, roadies videos (FF
making fingers, naked chicks, the usual stuff I guess !). After this appetizer
you finally reach the main menu showing the evolution of the FF logo from the
first to the last album (see logo pic shown earlier). Then a static and really
well designed menu invites you to pick up a destination.
You can go for 'movie' which gathers the four steps of FF evolution as an 80
minutes long sequence. You can go to 'Evolution' instead if you only want to
view these steps separately, each of them corresponding to the four albums
described earlier. Here you can run a documentary, run a specific video or
watch some photos. Surely the best part of the DVD since it really captures the
state of mind of FF, shows many different concerts (either it was indoor or at
festivals), plus many raving mad sequences : Burton C. getting tatooed, Raymond
eating god knows what, Dino going to sexshops or Christian changing haircut :)
It really gives you the feeling you * are * with them, on tour and the many
sequences are nicely put together.
I have to add that the guys of FF seem smart enough not to destroy their
hotel room unlike some Metal bands (do I really need to mention the barbarians
known as members of PANTERA ???). Yes, Metal bands can be smart people too !
MEMORY IMPRINTS
This section offers tons of photos, scanned posters, backstage passes, all
kind of stuff the band liked for some - nostalgic - reasons. It's like going
thru their family photos album and reinforces the feeling that they want to
share what they've gone through with their fans and that's a great thing !
DISCOGRAPHY
Here you'll find all covers of FF albums plus singles they've released so
far. Not the most amazin part of this DVD but surely a collection many fans -
like me - will like as it allows them to check their FF owned CDs !
BONUS TRACKS
The bonus part is really cool since it features *EIGHT* unreleased tracks.
Unfortunately - and unsurprisingly - you can only enjoy them from your DVD
player, no chance to browse the DVD from a PC to grab all audio files :( Still
these bonuses are pretty cool : half of them are "regular" FF songs done on
various occasions while the other half are tekno remixes of famous FF songs. I
like these remixes a lot tho they REALLY differ from the original ones !
EXTRAS
This last part is of limited interest since it's mostly composed of DVD
credits (boring and small, will anyone give a shit about that ?), links to some
official Fear Factory websites as well as some images to be used as wallpaper
on your (glups !) PC.
PLUS AND MINUSES
+ the first and only DVD dedicated to this great Metal band !
+ nice overall design and ideas
+ lots of private videos punctuated by FF smart point of view
+ nice videos (really hard to catch on TV)
+ great bonus tracks (I just love them !!)
+ the DVD leaflet features 4 pages written by Burton C. Bell about the birth
and vision of the band over the last decade.
- too expensive
- on some concert videos, the spund quality is really crappy
- too bad the bonus tracks cannot be copied to PC and listened you as MP3s
Now it's up to you ! To people who have followed FF from their first album
on and eventually went to concerts, it's a MUST HAVE !!!! Otherwise, you will
surely not see much interest in this DVD.
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