FEAR FACTORY Is 'Done Tracking' First Album With Singer MILO SILVESTRO, Says DINO CAZARES

At last weekend's Bloodstock Open Air festival in the United Kingdom, FEAR FACTORY guitarist Dino Cazares was asked by Neil Jones of TotalRock when fans can expect to hear the band's first album with FEAR FACTORY's latest additions, singer Milo Silvestro and drummer Pete Webber. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Everybody wants to know. So the record will be out next year. We're done tracking it. All that's left now is to mix the record. We're obviously on tour right now, so when we can get home later on this month, we'll start mixing the album.

As for a tentative release date for the new FEAR FACTORY LP, Dino said: "Everybody wants to know the date. I would say in time for the summer festivals next year."

Referencing the fact that FEAR FACTORY is currently celebrating the 30th anniversary of its classic second album, "Demanufacture", on a European tour, Dino said: "Definitely I wanna get new music out for sure. But I love playing our old classic songs because look at these people. They wanna hear it. They wanna hear it. We feel at home. We feel like we're a part of these people. I've always thought that way since day one, and I'm just happy to do it again."

Dino also talked about the fans' reaction to Milo's addition to FEAR FACTORY, saying the Italian-born vocalist was "100%" well received by the band's longtime followers. "We took him through rigorous training 'cause he was pretty much fresh off the boat," Cazares explained. "And so, everything from how he performs live on stage, how to handle the media, how to handle the criticism online. I pretty much taught him everything I knew to get through all this and to be prepared for what's to come."

Asked when he knew that he definitely made the right choice by picking Milo to front FEAR FACTORY after a split with the band's original vocalist Burton C. Bell, Dino said: "Right in the rehearsal room. He was the only guy that showed up that didn't have to look at his phone for the lyrics, what he sang. I had a P.A. I played instrumentals through the P.A. And whoever was auditioning, I gave him the mic. Everybody was, like, 'Oh…' Milo was prepared. And then he was so prepared, he was saying, 'What about this song? I'm, like, 'Oh, okay.' Put another song. And then through the course of three days, he did 15 songs. And he didn't have to look at the fucking lyrics."

In a separate interview with the Mike James Rock ShowMilo spoke about what it has been like spending most of the last two and a half years on the road with such an internationally acclaimed metal act as FEAR FACTORY. He responded: "Yeah. I'm really thankful for all the fans that are accepting with open arms this new lineup of FEAR FACTORY because it's really not an easy thing… It's a really big legacy and we're trying to honor it as much as we can."

He continued: "I'm a really meticulous, picky individual when it comes to replicating something. We're playing 'Demanufacture' in its entirety [on the current tour], so I went back to the stems of the record and even listened to vocals closely and just tried to replicate every nuance that Burt did. So, yeah, we try to make it right and we appreciate that the fans are supporting this."

Elaborating on the way he approaches singing the parts which were originally written and recorded by Bell, the Italian-born Silvestro said: "I try to sneak in some bits of my vocal personality, but not too much to change it completely. I try to sound like the original singer, because his vocal legacy of the band is such an iconic vocal sound, and you wanna nail that style. I'm still working on playing a cappella and try to nail the sound more and more and more because I think this band deserves it."

Asked if he ever has to "take stock" and realize that he is now actually the vocalist of FEAR FACTORY, a band that he had been listening to for so many years, Milo said: "All the time. I've always been a hardcore FEAR FACTORY fan, and for me, this is beyond crazy. When people are, like, 'This is a dream come true,' I go, like, 'This wasn't even supposed to be a dream.' My dreams were right here [raises his hand to his nose level] — maybe having some kind of success with my own bands. But this is just right here [raises his hand way above his head] or maybe even higher. It's so crazy to the point of fucking with your brain… [It's] so surreal that it's kind of like a drug for my brain. Like, what's going on? I mean, I love it. Also, it wasn't like most of the bands, like Dino [Cazares, FEAR FACTORY's founding guitarist], all these artists, they progressively went higher and higher when they were young. In my case, I spent most of my life, up until I was 32, 33, as a local musician in Rome [Italy], and then all of a sudden — boom — big stages and festivals, interviews, being known. And I'm, like, what's going on? But it's cool — don't get me wrong — but sometimes it's just, like, 'Whoa.'"

Earlier this month, Cazares told Slovakia's Tomketoviny about Silvestro and Webber: "The fans are reacting great [to the new lineup]. It's been all positive reaction. Milo, obviously, he auditioned 'cause we were looking for a vocalist. We got more than 300 submissions of a videotape of… This was during COVID, so a lot of people couldn't get on a plane and come see me. So a lot of it was just done online. And so we had a lot of submissions, and it was a lot of stuff to go through. But one stood out, and that was Milo. And that was pretty much how he got the gig. When the travel ban was lifted, he was able to fly into L.A. and physically auditioned. So that worked out. And Pete — we had another drummer at the time [Mike Heller], but our drummer had some prior commitments and he couldn't make it. And then Pete filled in and we decided to keep Pete. We liked his attitude, we liked the way he played, and that's really important."

FEAR FACTORY kicked off a European tour celebrating the 30th anniversary of "Demanufacture" on July 18 at Turock in Essen, Germany.

FEAR FACTORY's current lineup features Cazares, Silvestro, Webber and Tony Campos on bass.

Ricky Bonazza (BUTCHER BABIES) is playing bass for FEAR FACTORY on the road in Europe while Campos is busy touring with STATIC-X.

Silvestro's addition to FEAR FACTORY was officially announced in February 2023.

FEAR FACTORY played its first headlining concert with Silvestro and Webber on May 5, 2023 at the Whisky A Go Go in West Hollywood, California.

In the fall of 2023, Dino told Nyva Zarbano that Milo "brings, obviously, a freshness that FEAR FACTORY needed. The last singer that we had, obviously he had a lot of vocal issues and he really couldn't sing or do any of this kind of heavy touring," he explained. "It just was a big setback for us. So bringing Milo into the band, obviously he's got a great voice, he's very talented, he's a multi-instrumentalist. He could play more than one instrument. The kid's very talented. Of course, the story is I found him on the Internet. He was releasing videos of him doing FEAR FACTORY covers and he was posting them on all the FEAR FACTORY fan sites. And I saw him there, and I was, like, 'Okay, that's really got my attention.' But we had many people audition, but he was the one that really stood out. And he's a huge fan of FEAR FACTORY. And he pretty much learned from listening to our older vocalist. So he learned a lot of his stuff. And so, I mean, if you close your eyes, you think it's the original singer."

In early 2023, FEAR FACTORY completed the "Rise Of The Machine" U.S. tour as the support act for STATIC-X. It marked the Cazares-led outfit's first run of shows with Silvestro and Webber.

FEAR FACTORY's latest album, "Aggression Continuum", was released in June 2021 via Nuclear Blast Records. The LP, which was recorded primarily in 2017, featured Cazares, Heller and Bell.

In September 2020, Bell issued a statement officially announcing his departure from FEAR FACTORY, saying that he "cannot align" himself with someone whom he does not trust or respect, apparently referring to Cazares.

Bell later told Kerrang! magazine that his split with FEAR FACTORY had been a long time coming. "It's been on my mind for a while," he said. "These lawsuits [over the rights to the FEAR FACTORY name] just drained me. The egos. The greed. Not just from bandmembers, but from the attorneys involved. I just lost my love for it."