For all the controversy (which needs no recap here) surrounding classic members Raymond Herrera and Christian Olde Wolbers no longer being included in the current ranks of Fear Factory, Mechanize is a fantastic and devastating record that catapults the band back to the top of the metal world where they belong. I am a huge fan of Ray and Christian and think the whole situation is a bummer, but on the bright side Dino and vocalist Burton C. Bell got the best possible rhythm section as replacements. It is nearly impossible to fathom Fear Factory without Raymond (and Christian’s contributions over the years deserve way more fuckin’ props) but shit, Byron Stroud was basically in Fear Factory for years already and it is killer to have the Strapping Young Lad rhythm section in action with Burton and Dino. At least now we have two great bands with this new Fear Factory and Raymond and Christian’s intriguing Arkaea (with Jon Howard from Threat Signal on vocals).Arkaea’s Years In The Darkness (much of which was music intended for Fear Factory) may be getting frowned at by Dino in the press as unworthy, but “Locust” and the title track “Years In The Darkness” by Arkaea feature some truly sick playing from Ray and Christian that would’ve made great Fear Factory tunes. Everyone should just relax. As for the current Fear Factory line-up, the new music on Mechanize retains classic Fear Factory elements, while also pushing the band into faster moments than ever before, probably due to Dino’s steady speed fix in Divine Heresy ramping up his playing to furiously sickening new skill levels. It is frighteningly apparent on songs like “Powershifter” and the bruising new “Fear Campaign” track, songs that channel all the best paranoia and emotion of classic Fear Factory. Whether you like or dislike Dino, he is a fucking monster guitarist and incredibly important to heavy metal history.

Elsewhere on Mechanize, “Designing The Enemy” is vocally and musically rather reminiscent of Jesu’s mighty “Conqueror”, albeit with succinct Dino staple guitar chugging amidst the dirge before the whole tune accelerates into one big atom smasher. It is cool to hear a bit more of Burton’s long standing Justin Broadrick fandom in a song like this, as when Fear Factory delivered their still fantastic Head Of David cover “Dog Day Sunrise” on Demanufacture. I remember I was high and was reading the very last page of Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow in 1996 and “Dog Day Sunrise” came on and it fit so perfectly, one of my favorite musical memories.

I talked with Dino Cazares about Mechanize, touring with Metallica, what it felt like to be back in action with Burton C. Bell and how Dino has improved the soul of this machine his way this time.

MORGAN Y. EVANS: You recorded Demanufacture in my home town of Woodstock, New York back in the day.

DINO CAZARES: Yeah, man. Jesus, it was really cool to see how the seasons changed. We were out there in the late summer going into fall and winter. The trees are green and all of a sudden they’re all fuckin’ black and dead. It was good to do that one there.

MYE: You’ve always had an interesting and busy life, but lately it has been pretty crazy, huh?

DC: Oh, yeah. Burton and me coming back with the band and basically touring the world again.

MYE: Of course, and then I heard about all this madness that happened over in Oslo?

DC: Yeah, we did a tour with Metallica and unfortunately with the volcanic ash they closed down all the airports for the whole flight. How the fuck were we gonna make it to the next gig? We were flying everywhere. So was Metallica. Because they closed everything down we were like, fuck?! We had to rent a, like, regular coach bus, like a Greyhound Bus, and we all had to sit, about one hundred of us including Metallica in a bus. Then we had to take a ferry, everyone on a boat, but we had to make it to the next gig, man. Whatever it took.

MYE: [laughing] Did anyone get sea sick on the ferry?

DC: Yeah, uh, Robert Trujillo [chuckling]

MYE: [laughing] Poor dude.

DC: Yeah, but he had some pills on him so it prevented him from getting too sick.

MYE: Writing Mechanize with Burton, how did it feel to pick up your musical connection?

DC: It felt great. Back in the day we each came from different genres. He was more industrial and I was more metal. Somehow our musical inspirations crashed together and we found a common ground of how they would work together. It felt really good to mix those elements again. It kinda felt like we never stopped.

MYE: “Metallic Division” almost reminds me of something from Fear Is The Mind Killer and “Designing The Enemy” has that nice melodic quality you had on stuff like “Descent” from Obsolete, though this song is much heavier. Also, in your playing, you were always fast, but particularly since you’ve been doing the Divine Heresy stuff you’ve gotten faster and faster. This is some of the fastest Fear Factory stuff ever!

DC: It is. I think the excitement of us playing together again and of course with the legendary drummer Gene Hoglan, y’know, the tempos kicked up a little. We were going to like 210-215 bpm, but “Divine Heresy” is, like, 260.

MYE: [laughing] yeah.

DC: [laughing] Some of those Divine Heresy songs are, like, too fast! But yeah, we really wanted to pick up the tempo and have excitement and obviously, the record was good enough for James Hetfield to hear and invite us out on tour. That’s exactly how it happened. He came to our dressing room the first day and was like, “You guys made a fucking great record, man.”

MYE: That’s awesome. Dude, “Christploitation” has the epic side of the band also, it isn’t like you only went for speed. There are still epic moments like you used to have on the intro of “Zero Signal” and shit.

DC: Yeah, exactly, and we also did “Final Exit”, which is a very melodic kind of “Resurrection" type song.

MYE: Dino, how has it felt to reconnect with the Fear Factory fans since your absence in the band?

DC: I was a little nervous at first. I wasn’t sure how people were gonna take it. After the first show I got to talk to a lot of the kids. A lot of them were psyched to have me back in the band. A lot of them are happy to see me playing with the band because they had seen the band without me and although they still liked it, they felt that it wasn’t the same. They are really happy to see me and Burton playing together, so we’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback.

MYE: Right on. You guys used to do remix records for every album. Do you think you would ever do that for Mechanize?

DC: It’s funny, we talked about that. You gotta realize the record’s only been out a couple months.

MYE: Yeah, I know. [laughing]

DC: [laughing] You gotta let it ferment.

MYE: MORE! MORE! MORE! Get to work.

DC: [laughing] Exactly. Possibly. We talked to Rhys Fulber about it, so we’ll see what happens.

MYE: Let’s talk about some of the themes. “Designing The Enemy” and “Fear Campaign”, Burton is talking about paranoia and manipulation and some classic Fear Factory themes. Also, I was wondering, what is your take on technology and how it speeds up more and more, even since you started the band how much the world has changed…

DC: Yeah. We were always one of the bands that always talked about what the future would be like. We embraced the technology but gave you a warning. We were saying how there’s gonna be less and less human communication and everything is gonna be through the internet and less personal. Relationships are less human contact. You ever see that movie Surrogates? We were saying it is gonna go that far, maybe. We were talking about digital immortality where you could store your memories and put them in another body. We were talking about that and cloning technology years and years before it was going on as much as now. We always kept up on where the future was heading and put our own ideas on it and it is kind of funny because a lot of those ideas have come true now. Look how much the internet has grown.

MYE: I interviewed Dirge Within and they are a newer band that was heavily influenced by you guys and opened the first leg of your current tour. They were so psyched to be on it. Now you are going out with Prong and they are a classic band that influenced Burton and stuff.

DC: Yeah. It’s really cool to tour with Prong and wreak havoc. We talked about doing stuff with Prong for a while. I’m glad we finally got to do that. They were definitely an influence on Burton…and me as well, but I was really into bands like Slayer and speed/thrash/death metal, stuff like that. Burton was really more into the industrial side. I’m glad we get to tour with Prong. We’ve all known Tommy Victor for a while.

MYE: What of the old songs do you feel the best about playing again, Dino? What’s been exciting for you?

DC: Uh, well…on this next tour we’re gonna bring back a lotta songs from the first album. “Crash Test”, “Martyr”, “Scapegoat”, “Scumgrief”.

MYE: “Scumgrief” is my jam! I also love “Crisis”. Love that song.

DC: “Crisis”, that is a great song. We might bring it back. We don’t know yet. There’s so much in our catalogue. Everyone has favorite songs. Hopefully what we’ll be doing is rotating different stuff. We’re gonna do three or four songs from the first album. A few songs from Obsolete. A few from Digimortal and Demanufacture and, obviously we’re gonna do a lot of the new stuff as well.

MYE: Would you ever…uh…you don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to…

DC: [chuckling]

MYE:… but will you always be opposed to playing anything from the records you weren’t on?

DC: Of course I’m opposed. That’s why we’re not doing anything. We’re not doing anything that’s not from the Dino era. My era. But…y’know. I’m never gonna say never.

MYE: Like you said, you’ve already got so much to choose from anyway.

DC: Yeah. [in wise guy voice] If I did do anything from those albums I’d probably change it around a little bit.

MYE: [laughing]

DC: [laughing]

MYE: What’s next? Did you ever see yourself being back in the band?

DC: Um. No. I didn’t. That’s why I was doing Divine Heresy and that was going really strong, but I’m glad and I feel pretty comfortable. Me and Burton are getting along great. The touring is going great. This is the first time we ever opened for Metallica. That’s a huge first for us to tour with a great band like Metallica. We’re headlining festivals in Europe. It’s really good to be back and a lot of people are really digging this record. It feels really good, man.

MYE: I gotta thank you guys. I’ve been in bands almost 17 years and am a melodic singer often, but I always admired that you always went after your own sound. Not enough bands do that I it always made me return to Fear Factory records over and over again.

DC: Burton’s vocal style has become a staple in metal music today. Melodic choruses and heavy verses has become the norm in much metal music. Everybody’s been doing it and a lot of people forget where the style came from.

MYE: You’re revered but deserve even more credit and have been real road warriors in the trenches for years. It’s awesome.

DC: Thanks, man.

MYE: I saw Divine Heresy open for Moonspell, but I haven’t seen you play with Fear Factory since the Digimortal tour at the Chance in Poughkeepsie years ago. I was head banging so hard I almost fell over the balcony. [laughing]

DC: Wooah! Well, we’ll be out East again, man.