From the expansive sonic industrial wasteland of the instrumental introduction, ‘Resonance’, which culminates in a vortex of sound strong enough to rearrange molecules to the slow-burning dislocations of ‘Heartquake’, ‘Echogenetic’ is a sharp-edged work that packs in no shortage of stark, mechanised electro-industrial of the sort you’d expect from FLA.
As the press release explains, the title references the medical term ‘Echogenic’, which relates to matter ‘containing structures that reflect high-frequency sound waves and thus can be imaged by ulytasound techniques’ and as such, its focus is very much the synaesthesia of man and machine, a relationship of symbiosis and co-dependency gone wrong.
‘Leveled’ is sparse, stark and brutal, the distorted vocals low in the mix and enveloped in subsonic bass and dispensing potent images like ‘weeping maggots from your eyes’ in sinister tones. ‘Killing Grounds’ sees FLA on familiar EBM-inspired ground, a relentless industrial dance beat propelling a thumping bass and edgy electronic whirs and scrapes.
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‘Blood’ reveals a gentler, more human side of the band, its stark electronic backing a contrast to Bill Leeb’s almost tender vocals as he croons ‘You’ve got blood in your eyes’. ‘Deadened’ sees them recreating the sound that so heavily influenced NIN’s ‘Pretty Hate Machine’. If some of the material sounds rather generic of its genre, it should be borne in mind that it was FLA, along with Skinny Puppy, with whom Leeb started out, who really defined the sound over 20 years ago.
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