Fear Factory - For whom the Bell tolls

-Burton Bell : He didn’t participate to the concept, he just participated to the sound and the lyrics as well, which did fit very well into this concept of this world of « Digimortality » ; there’s no storyline on this album, but a collage of imageries, all sounds are collages of images, of this spirit we are talking about. B Real ‘s lyrics are really dark anyway and we share the same ideas about life and trying to get the strength of survive, the lyrics are very survivalist and so fit into the concept of « Digimortal »...

-You wanted to try something else, crossover songs maybe ?

- Christian : It was meant to be a B-side. It happened at the end of the session and the song came up really good and everybody liked it, so we decided to put it on the album.

-I've heard that Fear Factory is no more human versus machine, but human with machine...

- BB : The evolution of Fear Factory has been going on and humanity is still evolving. The future we are talking about, as far as I look, it's man versus the machine, whether technological or social machine, and we thought that something had to change, to evolve as well as Fear Factory, and the concept too ; so we came up with the title of « Digimortal », which condenses digital and mortality, digital technology and human mortality, and in the future man and machine will come together in union, because without each other, both would cease to exist. So, Fear Factory is constantly evolving...

-Was the creation process very difficult or very spontaneous, after three albums ?

-BB : We did think a lot about the composition of this record, that is one thing that also had to evolve with Fear Factory, our sound had to evolve, not only our sound but the composition basically. We had to go open minded this time and work differently. If it meant to bring in an outsider, which we had never done before, to help us get an idea of a new formula, we did that and it was very important. We took out the best parts of Fear Factory and we turned all the excess out and made compact little songs, precise and to the point. The composition definitely had to evolve as well...

-That’s why some songs are very short !

-Christian : Yeah, we got straight to the point...

-BB : In the past, we had six or seven minute-songs and a lot of time, when we played live, those songs went over the audience's head, contrary to songs like « Replica », which hit to the point and the crowds just go up, so we’ve been thinking of this live aspect, because Fear Factory is a very live band, as much as a studio band. So we took this into consideration as well and recorded the songs differently, thinking of the live show, and all together for the first time. All four of us tried to give the recording this live aspect.

-This time, you use real drums...

-BB : Yes, this time, Raymond played everything. But this time, we really went for the digital aspect. When we recorded, we immediately dumped it down on a computer with a program called « Pro Tools », which allows you to edit perfectly everything : bass, guitars, drums, vocals, everything was done on « Pro tools », and it was much easier for Rhys, our producer, who does all the programming. Everything was already digital, he didn’t have to switch to analog, it was automatic and the recording went very quick.

-Christian : Because we were very well prepared this time.

-You didn’t use Dave McKean this time for the cover ?

-BB : No, Dave McKean did not do our record cover this time. We started working together, but he wasn’t connecting, he didn’t get our ideas, so we found this Swiss guy, Tom Jermann, who lives right around the corner of my place in L.A, he understood instantly what we were looking for and produced it real quick. It’s a shame it didn’t

work out with Dave McKean this time, who is a great artist.

-What do you think about Giger ?

-BB : Giger is a fantastic artist, his imagery of biogenetic structures, very technical but very organic at the same time. We would use him, but he’s too rich and popular, everybody seems to use him !

-Christian : I’ve heard that he had some bad experiences with doing artwork for bands, so he doesn’t want to do it anymore.

-BB : There’s a lot of comic book artists actually who do great work ! Akira, all the manga characters. There's a great imagery and the stories are very interesting, but it’s not for Fear Factory. The Matrix has been a great inspiration on this record.

-Will you do remixes ?

-BB : Definitely, because, since everything was done on computer, it'll be real quick !

- If we take a look at your career, we see that your music can be divided in two main parts : the mechanical and thrash metal aspect and the atmospheres with keyboards and more calm ambiances : don’t you think that concerning the mechanical aspect, you’ve reached the limits and everything has been explored between « Obsolete » and « Demanufacture » and that it would be difficult to go farther concerning the development of this aspect ?

-BB : We've taken our sound a great distance, we definitively explored all those parts, but on this record, we finally found THE Fear Factory sound, and we are gonna continue doing that, because it’s part of us, it’s what we are. You keep learning, as you keep writing music, as you grow older you learn more about music, you learn more aspects of music, so there's always something new to learn. There's always the metal and the ambient, but you can always bring so much more.

-Christian : There’s a lot of things on this album we never ever did before, including playing together in the studio, Dino playing clean guitar, I played clean bass, no distortions ! Raymond played groovier, and in the end it almost became heavier.

-BB : The key for this record is simplicity : it doesn’t have to be very chaotic and very confusing to be heavy.