Friday 5: Five Awesome Industrial-Metal Albums (not by Fear Factory)
Happy Friday, MetalSucks reader! Welcome to MetalSucks Friday 5, our awesome series that appears every Friday (duh) on MetalSucks (duhh) and involves the quantity of five (duhhh).
Here’s how it works: A list of best/worst/weirdest/whatever five somethings is posted by one of your beloved MetalSucks contributors or by one of our buds (like you?). Then you, our cherished reader, checks it out, has a chuckle, then chimes in with a list of the same. No sweat, just whatever springs to mind, k? (Just like that movie about those losers working at a Chicago record store!) After all, it’s Friday — the day dedicated by the gods to mindless, fun time-wasting.
Today, let’s talk about dorky, dystopian computer metal!
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THE FIVE
What industrial metal bands should announce a new album?
THE LISTER
Anso DF, MetalSucks senior editor
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https://youtu.be/mk9A95qE_Gg
1. “Burning In Water, Drowning In Flame” | Skrew
from Burning In Water, Drowning In Flame
Metal Blade | 1992
Industrial-metal icons Fear Factory unveiled details of a new album this week, and it got us thinking: Are there more maestros of this niche ’90s genre from whom we’d welcome a new album? Answer: Yes. For starters, how about a reunion of future Nine Inch Nails guitarist Danny Lohner and screamer Adam Grossman for a proper follow-up to Skrew’s debut, Burning In Water, Drowning In Flame? Lohner appeared on none of Skrew’s subsequent albums and technology has enabled remote reunions, so the pair could renew that magical chemistry on a teeny budget. Click play above and you may opt to fund it yourself!
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2. “Landfill” | Pitchshifter
from Industrial
Peaceville | 1991
You’ll hear conflicting stories of which band originated heavy metal. It kinda depends on your vantage point, your definitions, and your timing. In industrial metal, no such ambiguity may tax historians: Ministry is patient zero. But the “metal” part of industrial-metal for some listeners began with Pitch Shifter, a dark drum-machine extreme metal act that later morphed into a poppy radio industrial thing. Crank it up!
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3. “Rivet Head” | Chemlab
from Burn Out At The Hydrogen Bar
Metal Blade | 1993
White Zombie’s breakthrough via 1992’s La Sexorcisto: Devil Music Vol. 1 may be underrated for its importance to the financial health of industrial metal. Zombie’s vibe wouldn’t qualify as “industrial” until the following album, but La Sexorcisto‘s million or so samples of cult movie dialogue broke down a door only cracked open by the likes of My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult. So there’s that. Plus, Zombie’s tour the next year included a leg with openers Chemlab, who, thanks to a low profile despite the exposure (drugs), kept fans digging deeper than Alternative Nation. Would crowdfund!
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4. “Vigilante” | Frontline Assembly
from Millennium
Roadrunner | 1994
You might never learn any lyrics on this album, instead you’ll just shout along with the clips from Falling Down and Full Metal Jacket, and hum Devin Townsend’s guest riffs. Tight.
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https://youtu.be/mBRSOjoOjAg
5. “See You All Were” | Danzig
from Blackaciddevil
Hollywood | 1996
Speaking of Townsend, I hereby vote for a new record of jams in the style of “Skin Me” by his old band Strapping Young Lad. An incongruous yet snug industrial metal freak-out on SYL’s debut album, it may be overlooked among the album’s melodic thrash grind ecstasy — but isolated from its neighbors, it plays like the Titanic crashing into an ironworks. Likewise, a moment in Danzig’s discography in which Professor Humorless embraced Reznorology and post-Rubin maximalism birthed a bunch of snappy songs. Inspiration is fickle.
Your turn! Have a great wknd!
