Front Line Assembly

Overview

The industrial music band "Front Line Assembly", consisting of Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber and Greg Reely, started releasing their music in 1987 (actually they released a tape before that date, but no-one seems to know about that). Back then, they made music which relied heavily on analogue synthesizers and drum machines, with angry vocals and massive usage of movie samples (mostly from horror movies). The whole music was often slow and heavy.

In 1992, they released "Tactical Neural Implant" which redefined the standards for excellent industrial music, even today.

In 1994, they suddenly changed their style. Their album "Millennium" shocked many hardcore FLA fans since it used aggressive guitars, multi-voice vocals and all songs were very uptempo. Gone were the analog synths, the sound was entirely different, it was more like a cross-over group. They even included a "rap" song called "Victim of a criminal", which has very US-critical lyrics.

They didn't stay with this style, though. The next album, "Hardwired", was a mixture of old and new - they still used guitars, but now, they also added songs which relied on synthesizers again (and on stolen samples and loops, from Apex Twins to Chemical Brothers, they ripped everything). Songs like "Infra Red Combat" and "Mortal" showed the new direction - digital synths, many samples and low, less aggressive vocals.

This was the way to go - the next real album, "[FLA]vour of the Weak", had all the guitar stuff removed and the sound was more like Chemical Brothers - they now used synthesizers only. Songs like "Colombian Necktie" and "Comatose" are pretty famous.

Today, Rhys Fulber is gone from FLA, while Chris Peterson took his place. Their latest album "Epitaph", released in 2001, sounds totally different. Low vocals, floating synthesizers and extensive melody keys define the FLA sound of today.

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