Dino Cazares Says He Will Never Speak to Former Fear Factory Bandmates Again, “Not Ever”
Fear Factory vocalist Burton Seabell has been embroiled in a lawsuit with former members Raymond Herrera and Christian Olde Wolbers over the rights to use the band’s name for several years now. The details of the litigation are quite complex and not all of the information is public, but you can find a synopsis of everything we knew about it as of October, 2019 right here. The ongoing battle has resulted in the delayed release of an allegedly finished Fear Factory album by Bell and guitarist Dino Cazares, who is not directly involved in the lawsuit.
Cazares, responding to a fan on Twitter, had some harsh words yesterday for his former bandmates, as well as expressing general frustration with the entire situation. The fan responded to a tweet Dino sent about his preferred guitar cables with a non-sequitur, albeit a harmless one, saying:
“One day I hope the four of you can sit down and continue the awesome work you guys did ten years ago. I don’t want to take anything away from mechanize industrialist and genexus those albums were greAt! But demanufacture is one of my top favorites of all time. #oneday“
“Ten years ago,” presumably, is a reference to Cazares’ return to the band in 2008, which was actually 12 years ago… but who’s counting. Herrera and Wolbers would end up quitting the band upon Dino’s return, while Cazares and Bell would go on to release Mechanize under the Fear Factory moniker in 2010.
Dino then started a new thread, tagging the fan and addressing his request head-on:
“Hey @mikedacabbie and anyone that cares to know..This has gone beyond the courthouse, People’s lives and careers continue to be ruined. I will not ever and I mean never perform or speak to them again.”
Woof. Being involved in a lawsuit is no fun — it’s an endless drain on finances, energy and pretty much everything in life — especially when it hits so close to one’s livelihood.
Separately, in a chat with Saturday Night Lockdown last night, he said:
“At the moment – the last three years, unfortunately, Fear Factory has been plagued with lawsuits, so it has been preventing the band from doing anything for the last three years.”
He also added, that he was “gonna be very positive and I hope in the near future that things will change.”
Dino chimed in with his feelings on the legal proceedings back in October as well, saying at the time:
“The Great Lemmy Kilmister once said ‘there are three things that could cause the demise of a rock/metal band: Drugs, Alcohol and Women’ but he forgot one the thing Lawsuits”
I feel for Cazares here, especially given the very, very sane individual Wolbers has proven himself to be in the recent past. He’s been held hostage in a decade-long legal battle he isn’t even named in, and we can safely assume one of the “ruined” lives and careers he’s referring to is his own.
Here’s to hoping Bell and Cazares can get things in order sooner rather than later and trot Fear Factory back out on the road, whether under a different name or not.
