DINO CAZARES Has No Information To Share About New FEAR FACTORY Album

FEAR FACTORY guitarist Dino Cazares says that he has no information to share regarding a possible release for the band's already-completed new album, tentatively titled "Monolith".

Cazares was asked about the status of FEAR FACTORY's first collection of new music since 2015's "Genexus" LP during a brand new interview with "The Metal Command" radio show.

Dino, who is promoting the debut about from his DIEKLUTE collaboration with DIE KRUPPS frontman Jürgen Engler, said (hear audio below): "I've got nothing. I was wondering when somebody was gonna ask me a question about that, but I have nothing… People ask me every day. I have no information about that."

Cazares also talked about FEAR FACTORY's musical evolution over the course of the group's 30-year existence, particularly as it relates to the decade following the release of 1998's "Obsolete" album, a period which saw Dino exit the band and focus on other projects while singer Burton C. Bell, drummer Raymond Herrera and bassist Christian Olde Wolbers carried on without him.

"[1992's] 'Soul Of A New Machine' and [1993's] 'Fear Is The Mindkiller' [EP] and [1995's] 'Demanufacture', there was only three of us — there was me, Raymond and Burt," he said. "Me and Raymond wrote all the music. We were on the same page. We were like two peas in a pod. We were on the same level [in terms of] what we wanted to create. We didn't wanna copy anything else, so we just exactly wanted to do our own thing, and we connected really well. So there was never that other outside writer coming in to bother us. We just did this, Burt would put his vocals on top, and it just worked perfectly. And then we had Rhys Fulber come in, do all the music. It wasn't until 'Obsolete' where we got another bass player. We started letting the bass player write a little bit of the music, and some of his influences started to come in. Then when we got to 'Digimortal' [2001], that bass player, that fourth wheel, he had more influence on what the record was gonna sound like. And I believe me and Raymond lost something there, because there was that other guy that you had to think about.

"Some people may take what I'm saying bad, some people may take what I'm saying good, but sometimes when you have a good thing and you try to bring outside writers in — I wouldn't say 'outside writer,' but another person to just write with you — sometimes things get lost. I believe that's what happened during that period — from 'Digimortal' on," he continued.

"So then, when I left the group, I got to go do a bunch of other projects that I wanted to do and I got to go and experience a bunch of different things I wanted to do. And when I came back into FEAR FACTORY back in 2009, I had a lot of other influences that I collected. When you go out there and jam with other people, sometimes it'll rub off on you — you learn things. And so that's what I felt — I went out there and I learned things, I came back and it was just me and Burt. There was no outside writers, nobody else clogging the system — it was just me and Burt connecting and making a sick-ass record. I think sometimes when you have too many cooks in the kitchen, it leads to arguments. Everybody wants to put their piece in there, you lose focus, you're thinking about other things, you don't wanna piss somebody else off, blah blah blah. But when it was just me and Burt, it was just me and Burt, and it was just like 'Boom!' — same page, same level, same way of thinking. We did what we wanted, and we went for it. And that's why 'Mechanize' [2010], 'The Industrialist' [2012] and 'Genexus' were very well-focused records. Yes, we did bring other people in, but initially, when me and Burt started these records, we started writing with just me and him before we brought somebody else in."

The tentative title of FEAR FACTORY's new album was revealed by Bell during an interview with SiriusXM's Jose Mangin at last November's inaugural Headbangers Con in Portland, Oregon. He also said that "legal technicalities" needed to be sorted out before the record could be released.

Back in May 2017, Bell told the Kilpop web site that the positive reaction to "Genexus" has "absolutely" inspired him and his bandmates to try to top it with their upcoming effort. "It was such a great response," he said. "Putting out that record was just positive all the way around, which just makes us drive even further and drive even harder. Now we've been working on a new album. All the new songs, I say, in my opinion, are even stronger than 'Genexus', 'cause it just seems even more tight. We're on a groove, and it's kicking ass."

In 2016, FEAR FACTORY completed a U.S. headlining tour on which it performed its classic second album, "Demanufacture", in its entirety.

FEAR FACTORY was the subject of breakup rumors in May 2017 when the band's former bassist-turned-guitarist Christian Olde Wolbers posted a since-deleted eulogy for FF on his Instagram. He wrote "RIP Fear Factory" and appended that post with the hashtag #GrownAssMenThatCantWorkOutShit.