Vocalist Burton Seabell Explains the Title of Fear Factory’s New Album, Genexus
Fear Factory’s new album will be called Genexus, which isn’t as silly of a name as Slayer’s Repentless, but is still pretty silly. Nonetheless, we can assume that the name sprang forth from the fertile creative mind of vocalist/poet Burton Seabell, and that therefore some thought went into it, right?
Right! In a press release, Seabell explains for the benefit of any fans who may not have a grade school education that “The word genexus is a hybrid of two words; genesis and nexus.” He then continues:
“This word describes the next transition in human evolution as man moves forward to a ‘mechanical’ state of being. [Computer scientist] Ray Kurzweil predicts that the singularity will occur around 2045. Genexus is the term for that next evolutionary process. Where humans are machines, machines are human, and the differences are oblivious to the naked eye.”
Here we pause to wonder how many people signed off on this statement without either noticing or bothering to point out that the phrase “oblivious to the naked eye” is not synonymous with the phrase “invisible to the naked eye.” If something were to be invisible to the naked eye, than the naked eye would not be able to see that object. If something were to be oblivious to the naked eye, than the object would be unaware of the naked eye.
But I digress.
Seabell goes on to explain that, yes, the album’s title is also a pun on Generation X:
“This album is a record of thought patterns, psychology and struggles of the Genexus generation. The cognitive machine has arrived, and it wants autonomy from the industry that created it. This machine struggles, like every other human has throughout the course of history. This is the story of every one of us.”
Second best quote from this statement: “This MACHINE struggles, like EVERY OTHER HUMAN has throughout the course of history.” Actually maybe that’s not a mistake, maybe it’s just part of the differences between Man and machine being oblivious to the naked eye.
ANYWAY, so, yeah, the short version is, Fear Factory’s Genexus is about technology, just like every other Fear Factory album. Yay.
Genexus is out August 7 on Nuclear Blast. One of the songs on the album is called “Dielectric,” which, if you ask me, is a far funnier play on words than the record’s title. Metal needs far more puns about philosophical discourse.
