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                        Front Line Assembly - an overview
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Front Line Assembly (FLA)  are  known  for  their  numerous  electro  industrial
records. They  are  one  of  the  best known  bands in  this genre perhaps after
Front242 and KMFDM. The mastermind  behind the  band always was Bill Leeb. He is
responsible for the concept, rythm and bass programming.

In their  current  existance, starting  from 1986  all the  way up  to now, they
released a  varied range  of material. During some years multiple albums of good
quality were  made, which put them  on the  map as one of the prime movers. Bill
once said that his goal was 'to become the biggest electro industrial band ever'
...

Let's start in 1986. Bill split from the pioneers Skinny Puppy, famous for their
minimal  electronic sound and satire. His main task in this band was programming
bass synths, definitely one of his best traits. This year spawned the first demo
tape that was later called 'total terror 1'.

However promising this name may sound, to me it was a slight disappointment. The
lineup is  excellent; Both Bill Leeb and Rhys Fulber. The  latter  is known from
the band Will. If any  Goth-looking  figure says  he hasn't  heard of this band,
he's either very young or a big time faker.

Okay, on  with  the  comments. This  albums  is  reminiscent  of  early  Cabaret
Voltaire. The  feeling is  slightly  ambient  industrial  with (very incoherent)
beats on  top. Some songs aren't  bad and  give create  a  good  atmosphere, but
others are pure dead-end experiments probably recorded in one go.

The second  demotape, part  2 of the  terror albums, is  much more coherent. The
equipment is  largely the same, but  the beats sound much stronger: the  typical
hard EBM of  the late 80's. If  you decide  to buy just  one album by this band,
this would have  to be it. It's raw, edgy, atmospheric  and varied  but  without
losing it's style.

So, in 1987 Third Mind, their  record label, was  convinced  and signed them up.
Strangely  enough, the  following albums didn't come close  to the brilliance of
the second  demotape. Sure, they  were largely  more  coherent, but there were a
plenty of  mistakes on each album. Bill typically did alot of voice experiments,
sometimes without success.

"State of Mind" (1988) has  a few  good hard  songs, but the  rest (softer) just
sounds too much  alike. "Gashed Senses & Crossfire" (1989) has  a few  club hits
like "Big Money" (catchy) and "Digital Tension Dementia" (okay), but also plenty
of stuff that sounds cheesy as hell to me today.

The later EP's "Corrosion" and "Disorder" were quite  good stuff, influenced not
only by EBM greats such  as Nitzer Ebb  and Front242, but  also by techno music.
The pulse is faster and the sound is fuller, especially when compared to "Gashed
Senses".

The album "Caustic Grip" was  more of  the same, but in my eyes even more catchy
and with improved punctuation. Some tracks are quite hard and fast. It did age a
bit over  the years though. The  sound of  that day (1990/1) was the sample. And
most of those were done in all it's fully seperated stereo glory.

This makes  it seem a  bit cheesy  today, but  still, one  can't help admire the
sheer catchyness of the chorus sections in over half of the songs on this album.
"We steal your dreams, control your minds, prosecute the fools left behind".
That is  one of  the most  memorable  pieces of  lyrics  ever, close  to  F242's
headhunter.

The songs  on "Caustic Grip" are  also quite  varied and it's hard to say if the
styles are  stolen from  other bands  or authentic. If  anything I'd say alot of
bands were inspired by this album.

But, in  my eyes, the  true  gem of  FLA's career  was the  1991 album "Tactical
Neural Implant". A truly astounding piece of innovation in Electronic music.
Fuck every other electronic band of that time, this is the most remarkable thing
of the early nineties.

"TNI" makes smart use of the typical 'trance' type synth chords and slick techno
beats. It  takes hiphop beats and vocoding, but places them in a completely cold
and dark environment. The production is also very very well done. The atmosphere
is awesome. You can play songs again and again and discover new small subtleties
even after 20 times.

Overall, this  is a very  soft album, certainly compared to "Caustic Grip". Many
times the beats start up fast, but evolve into a slow and trance inducing pulse.
This trick has been done before, never this convincing.

After "TNI" a long  pause came, or at least it seemed so.. Certainly noone could
image they could top  this? Actually, in my  eyes, they  didn't. The  next album
"Millenium" was just as much a suprise as "TNI" but not exactly for the good.

"Millenium" was in a desperate attempt at pleasing the distributors (RoadRunner)
who dealt in metal. And  because  metal always  outsells electro 10:1 (except in
Germany) FLA got the idea to move in on the metal crowd. Hey, if you are already
great in your own genre, why not expand a bit?

Still, the endresult  wasn't bad, but  many fans  just  walked away. Already for
"TNI" Bill had taken up singing lessons and now this? Blasphemy! "Millenium" was
a very guitar oriented project, with almost every song having a riff or two. Not
that it was  bad guitar stuff, but for many it was a step back. Greatness was to
be achieved  by punishing  current  technology, one of the basic DIY concepts of
industrial. Stacking up guitars was just going back to Pink Floyd days.

Anyway, judging  the thing without keeping in mind the history and concepts, one
can say that "Millenium" is  no crap. The sound is coherent, and it has got that
bite. It's  got  the  same  amount  of  polish  as  "TNI", albeit  without  much
innovation  or suprises. The team-up  with a rap crew was a good one, mainly cos
this is  like mixing strawberry jam with ehmmm.. spam or something. Hard to come
up with a  good way of  comparing, really. The  result  was suprisingly good for
sucha far fetched idea!

And this is  were it all stagnated. The 1995 "Hardwired", a well produced album,
really showed  every single  skill of  both band  members. The sound ranges from
hard to almost ambient, with  the usual  oversize  tracklength, a tradition left
over from "TNI". In my  eyes, the  first 5  tracks are  some of  the best tracks
ever. Much like the earlier work, but just so well done..

Great chord  schemes and  even some  good poetry. It's the cherry on top of a 10
year carreer. There  are some  silly tracks too, where Bill tries to stretch his
voice to no avail. But overall, it's a highly memorable piece of work. Respect.

And after stagnation comes decline... Bill said he would stop here, because Rhys
was heavily  involved  with  producing  his  baby  Fear Factory  and  because he
(unconfirmed) probably  wanted  more  money. Bill  focussed  on  his sideproject
Delerium. Previously  this band  released some material of varying quality, from
excellent ambient/tribal to dead-end exeriments.

Anyway, he had now found some female singers and adapted the style from ambient/
tribal to trance/ambient-pop, and this paid off big time. The new Delerium album
sold 20,000 in  it's first  few weeks; as  much  as "Millenium" sold in over two
years.

So, Bill threatened  to stop. Many  long-time fans (including me) were messed up
by this bad news  and asked if it wasn't possible to make at least a couple more
albums. And Bill listened  to his fans  ofcourse. What  a nice fellow, or that's
how it seemed anyway.

In 1997 I had  the new album  on order for a few months already. When it came in
the post I nearly  broke the box  and broke  both legs. Depacking and running up
the  stairs  at the  same time  is a bad  idea. The  first minute  started  very
promising. But let's say that was all. I hid "FLAvour of the weak" (a ridiculous
name anyway, who  would take  this serious *DOH!*) in a  very dark  corner in my
room, never to take it out again.

This huge fuckup  behind him, Bill continued with Chris Peterson on a new album.
Chris was another  guy from Will, in any case a good subsitute for Rhys. Luckily
they had  learned not  to fuck around with their audience and released "Implode"
(1998). An Alien inspired album not unlike "TNI". The  atmosphere was great, but
no track really stood out (unlike TNI!).

Later on "Epitaph" was released, but  this album seemed merely a weak version of
"Implode". No songs that stood out, some nice concepts matching the 'Zeitgeist',
but concepts alone don't work as we all know.

I planned  on buying  more by FLA, just  for  the sake  of being a fan. That was
until I heard  of their 'performance' at WGT in 2003. Bill seemed to be ill, but
instead of cancelling he ordered somekind of stand-in (!). Apparently, the money
for the perfomance  was tempting. Bill  really showed  his true  colors here. He
might have been devoted to DIY and industrial in the old days, but this was just
a moneygrubbing old git's work.

A fatal move. Surely  you can't think  that you have  no fans with more than two
braincells?

For me this  is the end  of a chapter. One  of the last  remaining electro bands
that was in some  way true to it's roots was now dead. Anyway, nobody wants this
negative bs. So let me  give you a tip: if you buy any album by FLA, buy some of
their early stuff: BEFORE 1997, it's too good to be neglected.

As for the  newer stuff.. Nowadays, the  electro scene  might seem non-existant,
but  there  is  a very  active  noise/techno/industrial-scene. The  attitude  is
largely the same as the old DIY days. Instead of buying some later album by FLA,
buy something from an act from ANT-ZEN, HYMEN, HANDS or from the numerous US and
JP based noise labels.

The underground is not dead, it just changed its shape! Stay strong!


discography (studio albums only)

1986: Total terror 1; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1987: Total terror 2; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1988: State of mind; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1989: Gashed senses & crossfire; Bill Leeb, Michael Balch
1990: Corrosion; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1991: Disorder; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1991: Caustic Grip; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1992: Tactical Neural Implant; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1994: Millenium; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1995: Hardwired; Bill Leeb, Rhys Fulber
1997: FLAvour of the weak; Bill Leeb, Chris Peterson
1999: Implode; Bill Leeb, Chris Peterson
2001: Epitaph; Bill Leeb, Chris Peterson

                                                                            earx
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